The Lost Souls Job
by UruExplorer DTC
Summary: -SEQUEL TO "THE WORKING TITLE JOB."- A Lost Soul Wanders the world, and finds a mate. A boy struggles with his place, and becomes a man. An Officer hunts for a crime, and finds more than she bargained for. Such is the fate of a world stuck in an Endless Illusion. But just what is a Detective to do when his main suspect is Butterflies? IngaXKazamori, ShinjuurouXRie
1. But I hear the Voices Say

**CHAPTER INDEX:**

**0: "But I hear the Voices say..."**  
**1: "I Rose above the Noise and Confusion."**  
**2: "Just to get a Glimpse beyond this Illusion."**  
**3: "Masquerading as a Man with a Reason."**  
**4: "My charade is the Event of the Season."**  
**5: "Carry on My Wayward Son."**  
**6: "There'll be Peace when you are Done."**  
**7: "Lay your Weary Head to rest."**  
**8: "Don't you cry No More."**

* * *

**CHAPTER 0: "But I hear the Voices say..."**

Lips met in the dark...and a flash of violet light briefly illuminated a woman's green eyes and Red-Brown hair.

She pulled away and licked her lips with a desiring moan, "So tell me, dear..."

"Yes?" The boy with her asked, voice sounding haunted.

"What animal are you?"

"A...Cat."

"Good boy," Said her sultry voice, "now 'Nyaa' for me..."

"N-_Nyaa_," the teen purred.

"Good...!" A smile... and then her lips took his again.

And the darkness was filled with a brief flash of violet light.

**I had no clue how it had gotten to this moment.**

Everything had seemed fine and normal after that day at the amusement park, and, despite the unsettling discovery made that very same day, everyone seemed to come out of it better.

But something had gone awry somewhere. After some unknown divergence, everything had gone pear shaped. I had to ask myself, "what caused this ridiculous scenario?" It was practically something right out of those galgames Sena and Yozora had played on occasion.

How did I, Hasegawa, Kodaka, end up trying to climb the side of a bell tower in an attempt to keep a fellow club member- no, a dear friend- from jumping off?

Perhaps I should rewind a bit? But maybe not. I shouldn't get distracted at such a critical moment.

* * *

**UN-GO**

**The Wayward Soul Job.**


	2. I Rose above the Noise and Confusion

**CHAPTER 1: "I Rose above the Noise and Confusion."**

**SATURDAY MORNING. 7:03 A.M.**

"Nyaaa~"

The robotic sounds of a cat mewing was accompanied by the weight of a toaster on his chest awoke Shinjuurou Yuki from his slumber bright and early on a certain Saturday morning. "Nrg..?"

"Nyaaa~" The toaster cat repeated.

"Yeah, mornin', Kato..." Shinjuurou yawned and went to sit up, which wasn't an easy task what with a toaster cat on his chest, and a girl at his side holding his arm tight to her chest. Well, she technically wasn't much of a girl these days, but the analogy of difficulty in terms of removing oneself from bed still matched up rather well.

Rie Kaishou, daughter of former Chairman of JJ System's Rinroku Kaishou and one day in the future to be Rie Yuki instead, was his partner in detective work and in other affairs. Around two, now almost three, months earlier on her seventeenth birthday, they had gone out on their first date, and ended up in bed that very evening after a case had suddenly been sprung upon them.

That...had been a rather stressful case lasting all of a week and a half.

Izumi Koyama, at the time then part of the Prosecutors Office, had set into motion a series of murders and world wide global changes that had become a sort of trial by fire that had ended up with a rooftop confrontation between the rogue Prosecutor and Shinjuurou himself being broadcast to the entire world thanks to a Math Equation called P Versus NP that had been released into the world as a "Universal Remote Hack," as the program and it's derivatives had soon come to be known.

But that had not been the only change to the world during that time. Due to Kazamori, then an R.A.I. construct, and Inga, then a "Truth" Eating Demon, messing around with powers they did not fully understand, Inga's many powers had left him, and Kazamori had been turned into a human girl. In the process of that transformation, a wave of energy had escaped from their former apartment in the middle of the bombed city, and had spread out into the world, beginning a series of dominoes that lead to every appliance and technological construct around the world coming to life with the personalities and behaviors of the various life forms on earth.

Such as Shinjuurou's toaster.

In any case, Izumi Koyama had made several mistakes- some of which Shinjuurou had not even noticed until a thorough review of everything once he'd had time to review everything in retrospect- and had been caught due to them.

First there was the fact that there had been no ties to the previously existing "Rising Sun" Group to the one Izumi's group had started, and in retrospect, the fact that Izumi had never even brought up the idea but instead ran with the assumption that it was a separate group should have been a warning sign. The fact that the one case involving the original group had been left out of all of Izumi's fact broadcasts... That should have been a tip-off as well.

Secondly, the hacker group "Full Circle", weakened as they had been after the Bettenou Incident, had been ignored as well in all of the events, and actually had even gone so far as to distance themselves from "Rising Sun" after Mitsuku Asahina had blown up the Kaishou household, stating that while they wanted the truth to get out about Kaishou, Rinroku, they derided the methods used to get those facts out there.

Thirdly, Shinjuurou had realized with amusement, had Izumi told Seigen Hayami about her plans, or even the other way around, that they might very well had been able to pull off both of their plans seamlessly.

Alas, each had the wrong opinions of each other during those times. Shinjuurou could only hope that they could find common ground in prison now.

Hell, maybe Hayami would finally 'get the girl' as the old trope went.

Shinjuurou looked Rie over as he ran a hand through her hair. She was, for once, sound asleep and he had managed to wake up before she did. She smiled at the motion, and sleepily sighed in contentment.

Shinjuurou gave a sigh of his own. Adding on top of all the chaos that was his life, Shinjuurou and Rie had somehow fallen for each other, much to the dislike of Rinroku Kaishou.

Speaking of that man, the entire world had seemingly turned on him.

Initially, Full Circle's hacking had put Rinroku on the world's stage as a person of interest- then the Bettenou incident occurred, and Rinroku had faked his death. But after the reveal of Hayami's plotting, Rinroku had returned to the world stage triumphantly for only a day before the world's governments set a hearing outside of Japan, to be held not too long after that.

And then Izumi's plan had been set off, blah blah blah, stuff we already covered twice over, blah blah blah, and now here we are at the present day.

And the present, presently, was all about Shinjuurou deciding what to do now. Either get up and risk waking Rie, or wait for her to wake up on her own...

**And then the phone rang.**

"Hullo?" Inga sleepily answered as he picked up the receiver next to the couch he'd been sleeping on.

_"Yo!"_ Came the familiar, chipper voice of Mayoi Katawase, Police Chief.

"Oh, hey Mayoi-chan. What's up?" Inga asked, wiping the sleep out of his eyes.

_"Murder, Inga, don't'cha know?"_ was the witty response.

"_ooooh_," Inga said with suddenly wide eyes, "a case! But we haven't really done any cases lately." He frowned, "Why call now?"

_"This is a pretty weird one, right up your alley. We only just started processing, but I figured I'd call you guys in early, it's a bit of a drive,"_ Katawase said. _"Seriously, Inga, you've gotta see it to believe it."_

"Lemme write the location down then and we'll be there asap.." Inga said, and went to find a piece of paper to write down the location. "So where are we going?" He nodded as he wrote it down, "uh huh, uh huh...Really? Wow...Uh huh... Okay! I think I've got it down! See you in a bit!" He hung up and took a deep breath, fully waking up before yelling: _**"SHINJUUUUUROOOUUU! WE'VE GOT A CASE!"**_

**Kazamori Sasa, a former R.A.I., watched as the detective and his assistant rushed about in preparation to head out with a calm fascination.**

"I know we haven't taken a case over the last month," Rie said in between spoonfuls of cereal, "but were they always this unorganized with early morning cases?"

"I don't know," Kazamori replied before taking a sip of chocolate milk. "This is the first time in my time with them that they've been called to an active crime scene while it's still being processed."

"Ah," Rie said with a nod.

"And also, it's the first time that they've been called in to a case by the police at all," Kazamori continued. "Typically? We've either been asked by a relative to investigate, or have been invited to an incident before it happens."

"So this is all unfamiliar territory for them, then?" Rie asked.

"Inga!" Shinjuurou shouted from one corner of the apartment, "Where the hell did Kato take my shoes?"

"How should I know!?" Inga shouted back from another corner, "I'm trying to find where he took my panda hat!"

Kazamori took another sip of her drink, and then answered, "Pretty much."

**A Camera flashed as Shinjuurou and Inga crossed the crime scene tape in front of the door to the small motel room.**

"Welcome to Casa de Murder," Mayoi Katawase joked as she greeted them, "formerly known as Casa de Sex-Motel." She lead them over to the bed where the victim lay spread out on it- hidden from view by a tarp. "Be warned, this is not for the faint of heart." With that, she pulled the sheet back down to the victim's waist.

Immediately, Shinjuurou and Inga's eyes widened at the sight of the murdered victim: The man's skin was grey, almost decayed, and withered tightly to the bones, as if all of the water had been pulled out of his body, and the eyes were blackened, soul-less husks.

"Shinjuurou," Inga gulped, "doesn't that...?"

"Yeah," Shinjuurou nodded faintly.

"I take it you've seen this sorta thing before?" Katawase asked before putting the sheet back over the man.

"I'd rather not talk about it here, but yeah," Shinjuurou said, "we've seen something like this before." He shook the ghosted expression off his face, and asked, "Who is he?"

"According to the wallet we found in his pants half-way across the room?" Katawase asked in return as she jabbed her thumb over her shoulder towards the discarded clothing item. "His drivers license says his name is Atsuhiko, Hirokazu. But his business cards on the other hand...well, let's just say it's a pun on the English Phrase "Top of my Game" and leave it at 'this Guy's a player,' which means the only thing missing is the cash he paid with."

"A robbery gone wrong?" Inga asked.

"More than likely, the gal who killed ol' Atsuhiko-san here took his money and ran after the job was done. Maybe to make it look like a robbery, maybe they just didn't have any cash on hand," Katawase said with a shrug. "She didn't pay for an extra day at the counter though. Maybe we wouldn't have found him if they had."

"Why's that?" Shinjuurou asked.

"The hotel manager came up here to kick 'im out when he failed to check out at the specified time," Katawase said. "Said he thought maybe the guy was just going at it a few times with the girl he came in with and lost track of time. Found this instead."

"Nothing so nice as that, though," Shinjuurou frowned at the body. "How do you know it's a girl who's the culprit?"

"Manager saw him check in with her," Katawase said, "we've got him with a sketch artist right now since the cameras in the loby are all duds."

"No cameras?" Shinjuurou asked.

"Nope," Katawase said. "Atsuhiko-san checked in under an alias. Paid in cash. This is _that_ kind of a place, you know."

"And who was it who said R.A.I.'s corrupted youth again?" Inga asked as he examined a discarded shirt, and wrinkled his nose at how it smelled. "Ew...What is that...? Perfume?"

Katawase chuckled grimly- "Probably off of the girl. I'd see about getting it analyzed, but...Yeah, that was Aranea's job."

"You haven't gotten the position filled in yet?" Inga asked.

"Nobody's willin' to take it," Katawase grumbled. "Everyone's afraid it's cursed or something, Even the Interim guy I assigned is bolting once his time's up. Cashing in every vacation day he's not used for the last few years." She sighed- "Also! Aranea password locked all the lab equipment. Nobody's been able to crack it yet, and like I said, Interim guy's bolting and didn't even order new stuff to replace it."

"So...Ah, you said something about a sketch?" Shinjuurou asked, trying to change an awkward subject.

**"Yeah..." Katawase nodded, "c'mon, they're downstairs."**

The Woman who had been the last one to see Atsuhiko, Hirokazu, alive appeared to be in her late teens, probably not even in her twenties, with hair color going just past the shoulders. She looked only like the woman whom Inga had once borrowed his older form from in passing. Perhaps if the suspect were older, she might have looked the same.

"So much for Yuuko being alive again," Inga said with a frown. "This girl's way too young."

"So you've basically got no leads then?" Katawase asked.

"Not at the moment, no," Shinjuurou frowned. "Let's retrace Atsuhiko's steps."

"What steps?" Katawase asked. "All we've got is the name, and not much else to go on."

"Well, his name and the fact that he likes sleazy dumps like this place," Inga remarked as he wriggled his eyebrows at the Hotel Manager- who gave off a protest of "Hey!" at that remark. "That says a lot about his personality, in my opinion."

"He probably picked this girl up at a bar," Shinjuurou deduced, "that or she picked him up."

"Smart assumption." Katawase nodded, then turned towards an officer and ordered, "Go canvas the area, see if there are any bars close to here."

"Right," The officer nodded, and went off.

"So what now?" Katawase asked, "We search all the bars in the area and see if Atsuhiko left something behind?"

"Something like that," Shinjuurou nodded. "If he's a regular at any of these places, the owner might know him, or one of his friends is looking for him like we are."

"Guess we're waiting, then," Inga shrugged.

**THURSDAY EVENING. 5:50 P.M.**

Upon arriving in the clubroom after school that one Thursday, I was greeted by Shiguma, Rika, with her hair dyed blond and styled into twin tails. She was just standing by the door, perfectly still, as if a model posed for a painting...

I wasn't sure what to make of that, but having recalled her rather upset reactions from before at my apparently lack of making note of her hairstyle changes, I thought it best to make a comment. "Hey, changed your hairstyle again I see."

I went to move past her so I could work on my homework when she suddenly whirled around and shouted "That's It!?" at me.

We shared some seemingly trite exchange of remarks that was my trying to tease her a bit about her hair changes, and it ended up with her being even more mad at me than she had been before.

Before I could even begin trying to pacify her, she crossed her arms and remarked: "Why are you being so dense?!" She said about as seriously as she could.

"Eh?" I didn't quite get what she was trying to say there.

"You keep pretending not to notice- pretending not to hear! Always running away, brushing it off! Avoiding the issues!" She was yelling, "And I'm getting tired of you saying 'what was that' or 'what'd you say' all the time!"

Honestly, I wasn't sure what was more scary at this point, the fact that she was calling me out on my pretend ignorance or the fact that she'd dropped the third person. This Rika before me was someone I had no clue how to respond to. She was someone completely new.

"Don't you think it's time we moved on from all this stupid child's play?" She concluded. "Aren't we all-"

"STOP IT!" I hadn't even realized I'd said it at first, but when I saw her blink at me expectantly, I wanted to run. I wanted to hide away. "I..." I really didn't have any choice but to answer honestly. "I don't want to ruin it," was what I went with, "I don't want things to change!"

Rika opened her mouth to counter, not that she'd get the chance. At that moment, Sena burst into the room, eyes wide in horror, "Yukimura's on the tower!"

Okay, I suppose it wasn't that big of a rewind, and the logical jump from there of "Running to the tower" to "Climb the tower to save Yukimura" wasn't a really big one warranting a whole bit of narration.

Not with a life at stake.

Yozora was still standing near the bottom of the bell tower, calling up to Yukimura to try to get him... Her? Damn gender pronouns... to climb back inside the tower, and Sena had rushed off after finding me and Rika to find one of the Sisters, so who knows where she was at the moment.

Rika had decided to climb the stairwell of the tower to the top, having ordered me to climb the side and grab Yukimura in case he- she jumped off.

I didn't hesitate. A surge of strength rushed through me as I tried climbing up to the top of the tower. I grabbed bricks off of the side of it and used them as footholds and hand holds, climbing up as fast as I could.

"Come on, Yukimura!" Yozora was yelling, "Just climb back inside already!"

Kusunoki, Yukimura- a girl raised to think she was a boy and recently discovered otherwise- shook her head. "I can't...! My parents...! They're-!"

Damn it. All those previous, seemingly casual, references to committing suicide that she'd made before suddenly came crashing down full circle.

Normally, the tower access was restricted to students just to prevent this sort of thing. I had no clue how Yukimura got past it, or how Rika would also get past it, but it explained why Yozora and Sena hadn't already been climbing the tower when we got here.

But it didn't matter- The tower was only (Only?) eleven stories tall. Eleven floors- eleven sets of stairs- something that seemed really annoying.

I was climbing rather fast, despite that, but I'd never reach the top in time.

Neither would Rika.

The bell in the tower rung, and Yukimura took a step off of the outside of the top of the tower.

You might think that this would be the moment where things get messy, and for a single moment, I might have thought the same.

But instinct took over, and without even thinking, I jumped off of my barely stable climbing spot, grabbed out towards the railing on the nearest floor and held on as tightly as possible as I grabbed Yukimura by the arm mid-fall.

I'd been high enough to stop her from gaining enough momentum, but also low enough to have enough time to pull off that crazy stunt, however that bizarre timing worked out.

She looked up at me, eyes wide as she mouthed, "Aniki?" I couldn't hear her. The bell was still ringing.

But as I smiled back at her, I wondered, "When did my life become an Anime plot?"

All in all, this really smelled like a bad plot. The moment where the dashing knight pulls the falling damsel in distress back to safety at the stroke of a bell. It simply wasn't going to happen: I couldn't hold on for long, since I didn't get a good enough grip when I jumped across.

We'd both fall, and then I'd probably get another nasty rumor added to my name...posthumously.

It was the exact moment that I began to slip that Rika grabbed my own arm- somehow managing to support both me and Yukimura. "Rika's got you!" And despite the ringing bell, I could her her voice call out over it.

I don't know what was more comforting: the fact that she'd managed to catch me as well as Yukimura, or the fact that she'd returned to speaking in the third person.

Rika'd managed to hold onto me long enough for me to get a better grip on the railing, so I could pull Yukimura back up towards Rika so she could pull her over the railing. After Yukimura got taken out of my hands, I climbed over about as well as anyone could, and settled down on the stairwell next to them.

Rika looked over to me as she held onto the somewhat shocked Yukimura and said, almost with a laugh that seemed inappropriate given the situation: "Rika doesn't think you have to worry about keeping the club the same anymore, Kodaka-Sempai!"

I couldn't help but groan.

On descending the tower, I found that the security gate that should have kept people from getting through was absolutly demolished. It looked like it had been just kicked off of it's hinges, going by the massive dent in the center of the solid steel plate that was lying on the ground.

Rika just shrugged when I looked at her, stating, "Rika swears it was like this when Rika got here!"

Liar. I doubt Yukimura could have done this.

Sena had returned at some point, accompanied by her father and- oh joy- one of the Sisters, Kate-sensei, Maria's older sister.

**This would be a "fun" evening.**

After we all had a long talk about everything that had happened, Kate-sensei had flat out told us that under no circumstances should Yukimura be left alone, "lest he try again."

It didn't take much for me to see the hurt in Yukimura's eyes when Kate made that slip up, although... There was something about Kate's tone that sounded...almost clinical? She's only fifteen and to be able to pull off that sort of tone... I can see why Maria calls her an 'old hag' sometimes.

However clinical the statement was, however, it was still a good idea, and Sena had decided immediately that everyone should come over to her place that night. Her father agreed with it just as immediately, stating that the best thing at the moment was for word of this to _not_ get out.

There was something off about how he said it. I just couldn't place it.

So, with that said, Rika and I went back to the club room to retrieve our forgotten stuff.

"I think this might be left field, but I think we could pull a certain trick off from one of my favorite comics," Rika said out of nowhere during our quick march.

I wasn't sure where she was going with this, but I noticed that she'd swapped back to first person. "What kind of trick?"

"It's a triangle romance of sorts, two people who hate each other are kept stable by one person interfering, but I was thinking of inverting it. Two people stabilizing one person."

"You really think we could pull that off?"

"For a little while, anyways," she nodded. "I think something stabilizing could keep the club from falling apart around us."

As silence fell down on us, I took that as my cue to resume our previous conversation.

"It hit me a while ago," I said some what reluctantly, "that even though we're doing all of this in the name of 'practicing for having future friends', we've all sort of become friends through it all. I don't want to see that go away at all."

"I see..." And that was all Rika said before we reached the club room.

Much to my surprise, Kobato and Maria were both in it, sitting awkwardly across the table from each other. Shouldn't they have been busy with something else somewhere else? Or maybe they'd been let out if the teachers had heard about what had happened with Yukimura...? But that didn't make sense for Kobato. Shouldn't she be working on her own Class project for the Festival?

Although, it looked like they might have gotten into a fight, considering that Kobato had some blood on her lower lip. How long had they been in here alone for? Maybe it was later than I thought it was.

"Yo," Oddly, neither of them said anything in reply to that greeting. "Kobato, Sena invited us over tonight-" Kobato seemed to tense up at the mention of Sena's name.

"And by us, Kodaka-sempai means the whole club!" Rika helpfully added, as if sensing the way Kobato feared heading over there. Kobato and Maria both seemed to relax somewhat... Odd, why weren't they saying anything?

"So if you're not busy with anything, we can get going," I continued. "We just needed to get our stuff before we go," and with that I walked over to where my bag had been haphazardly left on the floor.

"Ah, Onii-chan," it was Maria who spoke up then, oddly with a slight lisp to her words as she spoke. Sigh. She'd probably bitten her tongue or something, "I can come too?"

Not the question I was expecting, but I didn't see why not as long as she asked Kate-sensei first.

Rika laughed for some reason as she grabbed a book bag, which seemed to contain a few bottles of gel, going by the sound it made. Ah, probably the hair dye she'd used earlier.

Wait, did I just do that thing where I said exactly what I was thinking?

"Yes," Kobato and Rika replied at once.

Damn it.


	3. Just to get a Glimpse

**CHAPTER 2: "Just to get a Glimpse beyond this Illusion."**

**SATURDAY MORNING. 10:46 A.M.**

"Eh?" The man at the bar raised his eyebrow at the name. "Atsuhiko-san? Can't say I've heard of him."

"He may have used an alias," Shinjuurou asked, "something along the lines of 'Toppa Mai Gane'?"

That got a reaction, "Why're you coppers lookin' for Gane-kun? He didn't go get himself caught up in anything dangerous, has he?"

"He's dead," Inga said helpfully.

"He's what?!" The barkeep reacted suddenly to the news. "Wha...Dead...?"

**"He was found dead this morning in a hotel room using that Alias," Katawase informed the owner of a certain Strip Joint, "his real name is Atsuhiko, Hirokazu."**

"I...I see..." The woman who owned the place frowned deeply. "Well, I don't know much about this Atsuhiko person, but Gane-kun is quite the tipper!"

"Was he in here last night with this woman by any chance?" Katawase showed the sketch of the woman.

"Hm...Can't say that I recognize her," The woman shook her head, "she's not one of my girls, if that's what you're asking."

"She's just a person of interest," Katawase said as she folded the sketch back up to put into a pocket.

"What for?"

**"She's the last person to have seen him alive," Shinjuurou said to a Waitress at a nearby restaurant.**

"Ah, well, I can't say that I know her personally," the Waitress said, "but Gane-kun usually came in with a friend when he ate here!"

"Got a name?" Inga asked.

"It's...um..." The Waitress blushed, "I'd rather not say."

"Let me guess," Shinjuurou frowned, "another in-appropriate alias?"

"It's...fairly obvious, really. But nobody complains as long as the credit cards check out," The Waitress said.

**"Do you have any receipts?" Katawase asked at a gas-station.**

"Um, I think so," The guy at the cash register checked through the old-fashioned log book- "Dad's been hounding on me to write all this stuff down ever since all of our equipment came to life..."

"Yeah, funny thing that," Katawase cracked a grin, "my Phone turned into a blue bird."

"Lemme guess," The guy smiled, "Twitter?"

"Nailed it in one," Katawase laughed.

**"What about the security cameras?" Inga asked the manager of the restaurant.**

"Those things?" The man jabbed a thumb up at the security camera on the wall- "Decoys we had to put up after our last ones sprouted wings and took off to God knows where."

"Right," Inga frowned. "So you don't have any footage of the guy then?"

**"Nope."**

"Sigh," Katawase folded the sketch once more, "thanks for your time." She said to the bouncer of a night club within walking distance of the hotel. She turned around and walked up to where Shinjuurou and Inga were waiting by the car. "Well, that's the last shady place of business within walking distance of the crime scene," she said with a grumble, "you guys got anything?"

"Not much," Shinjuurou shook his head, "other than an alias for Atsuhiko's friend and a few credit card numbers under both aliases."

"These guys covered their tracks pretty well," Inga remarked- "makes me think that they've got something to hide."

"Probably an attempt to keep their real lives separate from their oh-so-religious time spent down here," Katawase waved her hand around at the city in vague motions before stuffing it into her pocket.

"Which means that Atsuhiko's probably someone with a life somewhere," Shinjuurou agreed. "What about his driver's license? Didn't it have a home address listed on it?"

"I've got someone running the address down now," Katawase said with a shrug, "So we'll see if it's a real place or not."

"You think he'd really layer on aliases like that?" Shinjuurou asked.

"Yeah, I think he would," Katawase said with a frown. "Anyways, you guys should get back to those lovely girls of yours. I'll give you a call if anything comes up."

"Thanks," Shinjuurou nodded. "I'm sure Rie would appreciate it."

"Tell her 'Hi' for me, by the way!" Katawase added.

"Sure thing," Shinjuurou agreed.

**THURSDAY EVENING. 7:42 P.M.**

Handcuffs.

I couldn't believe that Rika was actually putting forward _**handcuffs **_as the only plausible solution.

"Since we'll all mostly be fast asleep," Rika explained, "the easiest way to keep Yukimura from slipping away is to deliberately set the sleeping arrangements up in such a way that she can't escape from the room! So! Two of us will handcuff ourselves to Yukimura at one end of the room, and the rest will fix themselves up in obstructive places in front of the door!"

"And-" I can't believe Kodaka was going along with this, let alone promoting it! "-just to be on the safe side, I've already talked Kobato and Maria into staying in another room with the keys to the cuffs."

"Sounds reasonable to me," The Cow said- of course you'd be okay with this!- crossing her arms under her chest and nodding. "So how are we doing this?"

At the moment, we were all in the The Cow's house's Kitchen, the five of us standing by the door as we watched Yukimura eat a bowl of soup alongside an oddly cooperative Kobato and Maria, who were chatting to keep Yukimura distracted.

"Cuffing arm to arm," Kodaka said, "the two of us who're with Yukimura should be ones who are more comfortable on the floor, since I don't think three of us could fit on any of the beds here properly."

"Rika's slept in stranger places than on the floor, and since she was planning on being cuffed to Yukimura too, that won't be a problem for Rika!" Rika said with a bit of a chipper voice. What the hell, girl?

"Eh..." The Cow scratched at her cheek. "The floor doesn't really sit well with me..."

"You'll do it," I said decisively.

"Y-Yozora!" The Cow protesteth too mucheth. "Don't just decide things like that for someone!"

"We're deciding it for Yukimura without talking to her about it, aren't we?" I hit her insult right back at her.

"Eh, true..." The Cow relented, but then wound up for another throw. "But still, wouldn't someone else be better suited for it? Why don't you do it!?"

"Me!? Of all the nerve, Meat...!"

"Oi, oi," Kodaka stepped in. "Don't fight. I should probably be the other one to do it anyways, since I was the one to catch her..."

Not a chance!

"No way!" The Cow said- "What if Yukimura manages to slip out of the cuffs? You need to be one of the door guards so she can't run off!"

That was actually a well-thought-out idea, even if I disagreed with the logic entirely.

"Agreed!" I said, and I felt dirty for agreeing with the Cow like that. "We can't take the chance!"

"But then that puts us right back at the problem of who joins Rika in sleeping with Yukimura," Rika reminded us. Yes- thank you for that.

"Like I said, she'll do it," I jabbed a thumb at The Cow.

"Oi," Oh dear, The Cow seems to be growling! "I'll only do it if you do it!"

What?

"You heard me!" The Cow repeated- "I'll only chain myself to Yukimura if you do it too!"

Is she-? "Are you seriously trying to turn this into a competition!?"

"If _**you **_seriously want me to do this, for no good valid reason, that's my one condition!" Such pride coming from a Milk Producing Animal...! "Otherwise, I'll relent on the door guard thing and let Kodaka get cuffed like he suggested."

I could feel the gears of my brain lock up then- I couldn't let Kodaka be handcuffed to two girls at once, even if it was only to one via association...!

But...Kodaka just... why did he look so disappointed in me?

**SATURDAY MORNING. 11:08 A.M.**

"You just can't help but get the feeling that there's something missing," Rie said into the phone as she observed the recepie book infront of her. Why was she even trying to bake in the first place? To be productive? To fill the hours? To learn a new set of skills that would one day soon be necessary?

No- it was the simple fact that cravings had already set in and she wanted _**cake.**_

Not just any cake either.

She wanted a cake that never existed before in the history of cakes.

Rie Kaishou wanted a Half-Chocolate, Half-Red Velvet Cake that had Croutons floating in it.

Cooked Bread Crumbs, in a half-and-half mixture of Chocolate and Red Velvet batter.

What monstrosity had her cravings brought into existence?

Well, that was what she was asking her husband-to-be over the phone.

_"Ah...Missing?"_ Shinjuurou asked over the line.

"Yeah!" Rie nodded, though it could not be seen, "Like I'm missing some final ingredient to make it all come together!"

_"You're delving into dangerous territory here, Rie,"_ Shinjuurou warned her, _"one wrong move and your cake could end up as flat as a pancake...!"_

"Pancakes..." Rie's eyes widened slightly- "That's it! I'll add Pancake batter into it too!"

_"Wait- I didn't-"_

"Thank you, Shinjuurou!" Rie blew a kiss into the phone, "I'll see you when you get home!" And with that, she hung up. She then looked around the kitchen, "Now where's the flour at...?"

"I'd recommend against putting Pancake batter in," I said from the other side of the counter, where I presently sat reading a book. "The reaction between flavors might become off putting."

"Well what do _**you**_ suggest then?" Rie asked of me.

I thought it over for a moment, then said, "Buttermilk."

"Just Plain Buttermilk!?" Rie asked, somewhat incredulous...and then, "You know, that might be better than using Pancake mix...!" And as she turned to the fridge to see if we had any buttermilk, I gave a sigh of relief.

One disaster adverted...hopefully?

**THURSDAY EVENING. 9:42 P.M.**

Awkward.

I just don't know how else to put that feeling.

I'd gotten out of class- gone to the clubroom at An-chan's school- and...

I found myself alone in the room with Maria Takayama- that "Holy Nun" who was always hanging around An-chan...!

Nobody else was around. (Where were they? If only I had looked out a window.) So...naturally... We started to fight.

Things had been said, I'll admit, that someone of my..._standing_ shouldn't have said.

_"I'M JEALOUS THAT YOU'VE GOT BIGGER BREASTS THAN I DO!"_

**Especially** to a Nun, let alone a Nun who's a teacher.

But, then...

The next thing I knew, the bell tower was ringing, and I had her pinned underneath me and...well... I was biting her.

On the tongue.

Things seemed to escalate from there. I _might_ have actually drank some of her blood? Aaannd maybe,_** just slightly**_, convinced her that she was my blood slave now...?

...For a moment, she'd just stared up at me as if I'd broken her tiny heart, and I had to wonder if she couldn't even understand the basics of Roll Play and then I started to realize that I'd just _**french'd a NUN and drank her blood!**_

Then Maria just asked, "Does that mean I'm not a Nun anymore?" in the most...not angry and actually kind of cute tone of voice at all?

I panicked and just nodded, then...then...

She started biting and kissing me back!

I had no idea what to think of all of that, but then... An-chan came back and told us that we were going over to Sena's, and then neither Maria or me had a chance to really even _**talk **_about what we'd just done...!

Now, it was hours later and An-chan was entrusting us with keys to handcuffs so that Yukimura couldn't escape or something...? Was something wrong with her? It doesn't matter.

Now Maria and I were alone. In a bed room...No chance of An-chan or the others coming in to interrupt us.

I guess now was a good of a chance as any to talk...

Right?

"So..." I began about as smoothly as possible.

"So..." She echoed just about as equally.

"What are we going to do about these keys?" That...had not been what I wanted to start with.

"Hm..." Maria thought for a moment- then, "Do we have any loose string?"

The only loose threads I had with me were strings that tied the back of my dress together...So I suggested that we use those since we should be going to sleep soon anyways.

And use them we did.

The two little handcuff keys became matching necklaces within a few moments.

"There! Now we can wear them!" Maria grinned.

And I realized in that moment that I had really poor impulse control...

**SATURDAY AFTERNOON. 12:15 P.M.**

"I realize that cravings lower impulse control," Inga said with awe as he stared at the zebra-striped cake before him, "but I didn't actually think you were serious when you said Rie was making a hybrid cake, Shinjuurou! That's so awesomeeeeeee" He reached out to touch it, only for Kazamori to slap his hand away from the cake.

"Don't touch it, or you'll burn your hand!" Kazamori warned him.

"Aw, come onnn!"

"Seems like they were practically made for each other sometimes, weren't they?" I giggled while Shinjuurou just smiled faintly.

"Yeah, seems like it," Shinjuurou said as Inga and Kazamori began arguing back and forth about what to put on the cake for decoration. (Once it had cooled, of course.)

"So what's the case about?" I asked, and Inga tensed up at the question- stumbling across one of his comebacks rather horribly.

"Ah, just a guy under an alias who we think got killed by the girl he was having sex with the night before," Shinjuurou summarized nonchalantly. "We've only got a sketch to go off of, but the initial report made it seem like the woman was Yuuko-san."

"You mean...?" My eyes widened ever so slightly, while Kazamori's narrowed rather noticeably.

"The girl that Inga possessed just as she died," Shinjuurou said flatly. "We were worried for a moment that with Inga's powers on the wind, they might have condensed down back into Yuuko's body and started on a wild rampage, but since the sketch doesn't match...the only concern really is how the body got the way it did."

**The Phone rang.**

_"Hello?"_ Shinjuurou greeted.

"Hey, Detective," I said as I got out of my car and started walking towards an apartment building's entrance, "turns out the address on the driver's license is a place that was sold recently. So that was a bust."

_"Please tell me it's not a complete dead end?"_

"Nope, I tracked down the former owners- Atsuhiko's parents. Get this- they moved to work in Europe while lil' 'Kazu took third year classes at Saint Chronica Acadamy, a major Catholic school a few towns over."

_"Somehow Atsuhiko doesn't strike me as the religious type,"_ Shinjuurou mused. _"Does he have any friends?"_

"Yeah, older guy named Matsuda, Buriki, graduated two years earlier," I pulled the door open to the building and went inside, "I'm heading to his apartment right now. Atsuhiko was staying there for classes, according to his parents."

_"How'd they take the news that he was dead?"_ Shinjuurou asked.

"Eh, about as well as you can expect over the phone," I said as I flashed my badge to the woman at the front desk. "The Mom's coming back to Japan to collect the body and take it back with her first chance she gets, but you know how the international flights are these days."

_"Unreliable and Testy,"_ Shinjuurou grumbled.

"Yeah, so, I doubt she'll be getting in until after we solve the case," I frowned, "I didn't have the heart to tell her how we found him anyways."

_"What did you say?"_

"Classified." I then turned to the woman at the desk and said, "Hi, I need to speak with Matsuda, Buriki? Room T-4b?"

_"Ouch,"_ Shinjuurou remarked.

"One moment..." The woman went into the back.

"Anyways," I said as the woman brought up a key from the back, and stepped out from behind her desk to take me up to the room. "I'll drop by later to let you know what Matsuda has to say about last night's little adventure. I'm pretty tired on my feet as it is, I could use the break."

_"Using us as a rest stop, eh?"_

"Hey! Now," I rolled my eyes, "it's easier for me to come your way than for you to come meet me."

_"Yeah yeah, whatever you say."_

**"Yeah, that's the Witch who strolled into the bar last night," Buriki Matsuda said with a nod at the sketch. "Wouldn't surprise me that she killed him."**

"Did you catch her name, by any chance?" I asked.

"Eh, called herself Yuuko something," The older man scratched at his chin, "honestly, I barely understood a thing she said. Kazu, though... I don't know what kind of spell she wove on him, but he was enchanted the moment she opened her mouth."

"Hence the 'Witch' comment?"

"Yup," Matsuda nodded.

"Why exactly were you taking an underage student into the Night-Life district?" I had to ask.

"Eh, it was a..." There was a shifty look in his eyes, then he asked, "Off the record?"

"Off the record," I nodded.

"Honestly? It was better that I took Kazu out to those places supervised than let him prowl around at school," Matsuda explained. "Kazu was...troubled, to say the least."

"And the aliases?"

"It's that part of town where you don't want to use your real name..." Matsuda chuckled, "plus, the kind of guy Kazu was? It was better for him to use an alias than tarnish his 'good' name, if he ever had one."

"Was Hirokazu in any kind of trouble at school?"

"Damn straight- first year he nearly got expelled for skirt chasing which wouldn't have been so bad in of itself if he hadn't found out that the skirts were the only things the girls were wearing," Matsuda shook his head. "Kid thought that just because his parents were out of the country that nobody could reign him in. Soon as I found out about that, though, I told him otherwise before things got worse than a harsh reprimand..."

"Did it work?"

"I never got a single complaint from the school after I started taking him out to the bars," Matsuda shrugged.

Huh.

"Do you think this girl might be someone from the school?" Reasonable question.

"Not possible," Matsuda shook his head, "Kazu didn't recognize her...And trust me, Kazu would've panicked if he recognized her from school."

"A family member of someone from there, then?"

"That might be more likely," Matsuda frowned, "but I wouldn't know for sure."

"So, after this... Yuuko girl showed up, what happened next?"

"It was like Kazu got put under a spell," Matsuda said, "one second he was going on about this film some underclassmen of his were filming for their club, and the next he was drooling over every word she was saying. I knew something was up, but..."

"Why did you let him out of your sight?" Katawase asked.

"I blacked out," Matsuda confessed.

"Too much to drink?" Katawase inquired.

"No, I'm the designated driver every single time. I had to remain sober," Matsuda said. "What happened was...just...I just suddenly woke up standing there hours later when someone shook me and said they were closing...Apparently I'd just been standing there staring off into space for hours."

"Hence the witch thing?"

"Hence the witch thing."

"Well, thank you for your time," I bowed.

"You catch the bitch who killed Kazu, okay?" Matsuda insisted.

"We'll do our best."

And that's a promise.

**"Atsuhiko may have been a perverted jerk, but nobody deserves to go out that way," Rie said before putting a spoonful of cake into her mouth.**

"Agreed," I said with a grimace- "I don't like the fact that the girl's using the name Yuuko though."

"Back to square one, then?" Katawase asked, Touch-screen Cellphone in hand as she read up on something.

"Something like that," I sighed.

"So what about that school, Saint Chroma's?" Rie asked.

"Saint Chronica's," Katawase corrected as she paged through info on her phone- "nothing too out of the ordinary at a casual glance, although..."

"Although?" Rie frowned.

"The School _is_ closed from yesterday to Monday due to an attempted suicide leap off of one of the bell towers," Katawase frowned. "Classes are expected to resume then, with Clubs the following Wednesday."

"Suicide attempt?" I asked. "By whom?"

"Ident's being with-held from the news by the Chairman," Katawase frowned at the School's MyFace page, "Rumors seem to be that friends of the Chairman's daughter saved whoever it was that leaped off of the tower.

"Great," Rie said with a frown, "another coverup. Just what we needed."

"I think it's mostly to protect the kids from any harassment," I guessed.

"Yeah, that's standard O.P. for something like this," Katawase nodded in agreement. "Withholding a name, I mean. I could pull some strings to get the kid's name, but I doubt they're this "Yuuko" girl we're looking for."

"Well, I guess we'll have to wait until the school re-opens," I said with a sigh. "I can't imagine what the kids there are going to think when they find out a student died after a suicide was interupt-" He stopped mid sentence.

"You don't think...?" Rie began.

"That the Death might have transferred to some unlucky student?" It was a distinct possibility.

"Wait wait wait-" Katawase interrupted. "That's really treading into supernatural territory here. Deaths can't _jump_ from person to person, and even if they _could,_ the type of death is completely wrong!"

"You mean shriveling up into a corpse rather than suffering injuries from a fall?" Rie asked.

"Yeah, That," Katawase said and I could just imagine her holding up a sign with an arrow pointing upwards with the text "Yeah, That," Written beneath it.

"That's true," I grumbled, "I guess we really are back at Square One, aren't we?"

"Well, unless "Yuuko" decides to kill again, we are until the school opens up," Katawase agreed.

"And so we wait."

There was a sudden crash from another room and I frowned at the sudden string of curses that followed it, "Inga, Kazamori?"

"It's nothing!" Inga yelled- "I just dropped something-"

"Dropped!? You tripped over a power cord and broke the lamp on the floor!" Kazamori yelled back at him.

"Not again," Rie sighed as they started arguing about who dropped what when and where.

"Are they okay?" Kazamori asked.

"It's been getting worse lately," I grumbled.

"Kazamori's just not really..." Rie paused as there was a loud yell of "FINE!" and Inga came storming out, muttering about having to buy a new lamp for Kazamori's nightstand. The door slammed behind him roughly. "...all that used to the mood swings."

"If I ever get a boyfriend who isn't afraid of me being the Police Chief," Katawase began, then stopped. "No, wait. Never mind. I've resigned myself to that never happening."

"I'm sure it'll happen one day," I said as Rie and I both put a hand on her shoulders comfortingly.

"Yeah yeah, save it for another time, Lovebirds." I grumbled at them.


	4. Masquerading as a Man with a Reason

**CHAPTER 3: "Masquerading as a Man with a Reason."**

**FRIDAY MORNING. 8:18 A.M.**

"I've closed school for today," Daddy said to us, "and pushed today's classes back until Monday. I want you all to have the best opportunity possible to sort this whole mess out on your own..."

"Thanks, Daddy!" I said to him.

"We appreciate the courtesy, Kashiwazaki-Sama" Kodaka said with a bow.

"Although, I'm going to have to push club activities back to Wednesday," Daddy then said the few words I didn't want to hear!

"W-what!?"

"It's School policy, dear, I'm afraid," Daddy said. "I can't resume club activities that soon. And the festival...? That might have to be canceled entirely."

"I understand," Kodaka said before I could say anything, "I'll let the others know."

"I'll trust you can keep this situation from getting too far out of control, Kodaka-san?" Daddy asked.

"We'll do our best," was all Kodaka said.

"What was that about!?" I asked as we left Daddy's office.

"It's not like we can argue with the Chairman of the school," Kodaka said. "The Neighbor's Club can wait a few days. And the festival being canceled? That might not be such a bad thing all things considered..."

"What!?" I nearly shouted- gotta keep it contained. Low level. Don't want anyone freaking out now...

"Do you honestly think that anyone would be okay with filming a movie at this point?" Kodaka asked me...And I had to admit, it was a fairly decent point, but even so...

"I still think canceling it is a bad idea in that case," I tried to defend my point, "we might get more attention with the festival being put off than if it wasn't."

"Preaching to the Choir here, Sena," Kodaka shrugged, "I can't do much of anything about it."

"Then I'll speak with the Manager then!" With that- I turned back around to talk to Daddy.

**FRIDAY MORNING. 11:08 A.M.**

In all honesty, I was dreading what we were about to do.

With Kobato and Maria off elsewhere, Sena trying to convince her father to allow the Festival to continue, and Yozora off in the kitchen seeing if there was any food left for lunch after we'd gone through quite a bit of food at Dinner and Breakfast; Rika and I were going to talk with Yukimura about what had spurred on last night's swan dive off the bell tower.

Somehow, I had a feeling that I wasn't going to like what I heard.

"So, Yukimura," I began about as calmly as I could, "how're you feeling this morning?"

"Functionally Adequate," Yukimura said with a small nod- the picturesque image of sanity that I'd known her to have before.

Even though Rika was keeping quiet through all of this, instead writing things down on a laptop that she'd carried with her, the look she gave me at that comment said that Rika and I were both doubting her sincerity at that comment.

"Would you be okay with telling us what happened last night?" I asked.

Yukimura frowned slightly- I'm guessing she knew what we were trying to do here, and was probably trying to phrase her words specifically...

"I-" She stopped before she even began, then glanced to her left, away from both of us. It was surreal- it seemed like she was looking at someone else in the room, but there was nobody there. Had she really cracked that badly, or...? "Yesterday morning, I told my parents that I found out my true gender."

'Or maybe she was just remembering an event from the night before,' Rika suggested to me when I brought this up later on. Either way...

"Ah," I said, unsure of how to continue off of that.

Thankfully, Yukimura continued on of her own choice.

"I asked them why," she said- knowing that we knew what the 'why' in that sentence was shorthand for- "and..." Yukimura choked up- and I swear that the room got just a touch colder at that moment. "And Mother...She wanted a boy. And Father..."

I really was not liking where this was going.

"He..." Yukimura's hands clenched up tightly, "he said...that I..."

"It's alright," I stopped her before she could relive those memories, "I think we get the picture."

_**And that was that.**_

We knew now what made Yukimura try to jump.

I want to say that the rest of Friday, and even the following Saturday, was something to write about- but other than Yukimura moving in with Rika for the foreseeable future, nothing of note happened.

If, say, when we had been retrieving Yukimura's stuff from her house, that her parents had been there to cause some kind of confrontation, that would have been perfectly fitting for this kind of narrative.

But they weren't there.

I want to say that was odd, but given that Yukimura chose that specific time to head over, it was more than likely that she knew they wouldn't be home.

In all honesty- the entire weekend just seemed to blur together despite nothing of importance happening.

I suppose that's what happens when you have a near-death experience climbing up a Bell Tower?

Still, something nagged at the back of my mind.

What had caused that one gate to be broken in like it had been?

Yukimura was nowhere near strong enough to break it- and both she and Rika swore that they had found it that way.

It was almost as if a car had hit it, but there was no way that a car could have even gotten in that far to damage the gate without breaking the building surrounding it...

But I wasn't a detective, figuring out what had caused it would have to be delegated to other people...

And speaking of Detectives, come Monday morning at School, the Chairman delivered a shocking announcement.

_**"It is my regret to inform you all that Atsuhiko, Hirokazu-san, was tragically killed early Saturday morning. The Police are investigating into his activities over the last month, and I would like to recommend to all of you that if you know anything about that time that you speak to their representatives during their visit. They'll be conducting interviews in the Main Office after lunch bell, and the lunch period will last an extra hour today due to special circumstances."**_

That came just before the announcements that all Extra Curricular activities were put on hold until Wednesday- although no mention of the festival being canceled was made.

"Atsuhiko-san?" Yozora asked me during the first break between classes- marching right over to my desk and striking up a conversation. "I heard rumors about that guy. Believe it or not, he managed to rack up more embarrassing rumors about himself in less time than you have so far!"

"Don't say that like it's a good thing," I remarked in return. At least my "Delinquent" status had been all but forgotten about for the moment- everyone seemed to be enthralled with Thursday night's "Mystery Suicide" and this Atsuhiko's murder to spread gossip about me.

"I'm just saying, Kodaka!" Yozora remarked- "If only I'd decided to make a "Detective's Club" instead of the Neighbor's club! Imagine that! Two whole mysteries dumped right on our laps in a row!"

"One of those really isn't a mystery," I wanted to say, but kept my mouth silent for a change. Instead, I asked; "So what did this Atsuhiko guy do, dare I ask?"

"Skirt chaser," Yozora said as she twirled with a short strand of hair- a hold over habit from when her hair had been longer. "He's the reason we girls are encouraged to wear underwear to school."

"Eh?" I don't think I want to know why she phrased it like that. Isn't something like that _required-?_ "Wait- no. On second thought, I don't think I want to know," about the status of whether or not the girls at this school are intentionally not wearing their underwear underneath those mini-skirts.

Good grief, I think Rika's perverted personality has started to rub off on me.

"At any rate," Yozora didn't seem to care about how awkwardly I'd phrased my thoughts, and I was thankful for that. "He stoped after a threat of expulsion," She placed her fist into her left hand's palm with a hefty 'thud', "but something tells me that he didn't actually stop his perverted ways...!"

"Did you actually meet this guy?" I asked.

"No, but that's to be expected of a guy a grade higher than us," Yozora remarked.

"So wait- he first caused trouble over two years ago?" Yozora nodded. "And those rumors have persisted all that time?"

"Well, he is...was," Yozora corrected herself, "a student here. It's not like he'd graduated ten years ago or something."

I'm still not sure whether or not I should be relieved by the way she said that.

**MONDAY, 11:50 A.M.**

"It's kind of weird going to someone elses high school," Rie said as she settled down into a chair.

"I feel weird just being here," I grumbled. "This whole place reminds me too much of the cave Bettenou and I were in."

"Relax, Inga," Shinjuurou said as he shuffled through some papers. "We're only in the School building itself- not the church."

"Why does a School even need a Church anyways?" I frowned.

"Because...?" Rie frowned- "I dunno, it's just the thing to do?"

"You should have no reason to be concerned," Kazamori said as she finished logging into the school's public server's top most layer of information via her trusty laptop. "This school, despite claiming to be Catholic in dominion, only practices it in name only. According to Legend, the Church seems to have been erected as a Shrine to 'hold back wayward spirits' in the Edo era, and during Christianity's introduction to Japan it was converted and reconstructed to a Catholic Church as a way to provide continued protection from the spirits while 'doubling down' on the protection by supposedly converting the Shrine Maidens to Catholic Nuns."

"Supposedly?" Shinjuurou asked with a raised eyebrow.

"One of the teachers we spoke to is only fifteen years old," Kazamori clarified. "Traditionally, Nuns aren't brought into the service until they are many years older." She paused for a moment, then added, "Mikos on the other hand..."

"Great!" I shuddered, "Mikos. Just great. No wonder this place feels like Bettenou."

"Continuing on," Kazamori continued, "the School "Saint Chronica Academy" as it presently stands was established within the last sixty years, and the Church's resident Nuns were hired on as faculty for the School, with the 'safe harbor' clause allowing club rooms to be placed inside the Church itself."

"Wait. What?" Rie frowned, "That doesn't sound right..."

"Reasons for this aren't listed on this layer of the server that I can find, and our previous sweeps of the school's history from the general Internet failed to bring up any of this information before." Kazamori frowned- "I would need to dig into the School's private server partition to see if there is any record of the why, but that would be unwise given that manually hacking in would be more risky than if I were still an R.A.I."

I looked away from her towards a wall- "Great, so I guess we're still at square one?"

"More like Square Three," Kazamori said. "It's fairly easy to guess that- given the Supernatural cause of Atsuhiko's death- a spirit may have been summoned and slipped through the original barrier keeping them at bay."

"Summoned, huh?" Shinjuurou mused, glancing over at Rie, who flushed slightly at the attention.

"Hey, don't look at me, Yuuki, Shinjuurou!" She remarked, "I'm completely new to this magical mystery stuff, alright?"

"If you're thinking that my powers settled on a student here," I began, "and that Yuuko is-"

"DE-JA-VU!" Came a cry from outside the hallway just then- "I had a dream about this _**exact thing **_last night!"

The door opened- and an excited looking boy came through the door, grinning widely.

"Uh, hi," Shinjuurou stared at the boy, "name?"

"Name's Kananaskae!" the boy said with a grin.

"And you're here about Atsuhiko, Hirokazu's death?" Rie asked.

"Nope!" the boy laughed- "I just wanted to see if you guys looked like you did in my dream! And-!" Before he could finish, Inga was already pushing him back out the door.

"Sorry, but unless you've anything important to say about the case, then you're wasting our time!" I kicked the kid out.

"Yeah, I remember you saying that too," The kid said with a content sigh.

"Yeah, nice talkin' with ya," I grumbled as he slipped away.

"I'll call if I have any more dreams!"

"You don't have our number," I sighed, then turned on the small line of kids that were waiting there and yelled: "NEXT!"

**"D...Don't laugh," a boy said, "but my name is Hirasaka, Yonaga-"**

"Hime?" Kazamori finished, even as I cried out "YONAGA-HIME!" in chant.

"It's all a huge coincidence, I swear to you!" The boy bowed his head, "Just call me Hirasaka, please? I get enough grief from my cousins as it is...!"

"Do you know anything about Atsuhiko, Hirokazu's activities over the last month?" Shinjuurou asked.

"Hirokazu-san was..." Hirasaka began, "troubled. I guess is the word. I was unfortunate enough to have him in my class for every year." He tensed up- "Not to speak ill of the dead, or anything...!"

"That's alright," Rie said with a kind smile, "we get that alot."

"Well, he was the kind of guy that kept to himself after he nearly got expelled," Hirasaka said. "But you knew he was thinking perverted things about the girls around him..."

"Did he ever act on those impulses in class?" Kazamori asked.

"No...although there was this one girl who took an interest in him," Hirasaka said.

"Who?" Shinjuurou asked.

**"Hidaka, Hinata, Student Council President," the girl with long, dark brown hair and sparkling, golden-brown eyes said in introduction.**

"Did you know Atsuhiko, Hirokazu well?" Shinjuurou asked.

"He and I dated once, in second year," Hinata said, "it didn't last that long. We just weren't compatible as a couple. I tried to remain friends with him, however."

"Did you know about his...ah...late night activities?" Rie asked.

"I knew he had..._experience,_" Hinata smiled slightly with a faint giggle escaping her lips a moment later, "we all have our vices after all."

"Was that the reason you stopped dating?" Shinjuurou asked.

"No, actually," Hinata shook her head. "I'd known about it before a mutual friend of ours set us up on that date in the first place."

"Did you two have sex?" I just threw the question out there without the vaguest hint of tact.

"Er- um-" Hinata's face went red. "What kind of-? No! We most certainly did not!"

"Um," Rie tried to change the subject, "who was this friend of yours who set you up?"

**"Caelon, Watanabi, nice to meet 'cha," the grey eyed, black haired girl introduced herself.**

"Nice to meet you, Watanabi-chan," Rie said with a smile.

"Anything to help catch the guy who killed Kazu-kun," Watanabi smiled back.

"Hidaka, Hinata-san told us you set her up on a date with Atsuhiko?" Shinjuurou asked.

"Heh," the girl smirked, "yeah. Hinata-chan's that goody two-shoes type. But she works herself to death sometimes. I set her and Kazu-kun up so she could, ah...what's the phrase...?" She thought for a moment, then said in perfect English while that smirk widened into a full blown grin, "_Blow off some steam._"

"You mean they were having sex?" I once again threw the question out there. Tact? What is this word that you speak of?

"Got it in one," Watanabi laughed. "Don't let it get out though," she then said with a suddenly serious tone, "if her parents find out, she's off the Student Council."

"So you set them up on purpose, knowing Atsuhiko's history?" Rie asked.

"Heck yeah!" Watanabi confessed, "And I knew it a lot better than most people do."

"Why's that?" Shinjuurou asked.

Watanabi leaned forward in her chair and smirked at them- "I was the gal who got him hooked on skirt chasing in the first place."

Kazamori, Shinjuurou, Rie, and I all shared an identical glance as we thought an identical thought: _'Jackpot!'_

**"One more thing," Rie said, holding out the sketch. "Do you recognize this girl?"**

'Yonaga-hime' shook his head no, "No, sorry."

**"One last question," Shinjuurou said as he held out the sketch- "Do you recognize this girl?"**

"Who is she?" Hinata asked.

"Just a person of interest," Rie said.

"I want to say 'yes', but..." Hinata frowned- "She might be a relative of someone I've seen in class, but otherwise, no, I'm sorry but I don't recognize her."

**"Before we continue on with that line of questioning," Kazamori spoke up then, pushing the sketch across the table. "Do you recognize this girl?"**

"Yeah, kinda," Watanabi raised an eyebrow. "She sorta looks like the kid who jumped off of the bell tower the other day, but only if that kid were a girl, and a few years older. Maybe she's a cousin or something?"

"That was our assumption," Shinjuurou said, "that she was related to someone here at the school, given the timing of Atsuhiko's death to the suicide attempt."

"Do you know this kid's name?" Rie asked.

"Sorry, not a clue," Watanabi shook her head. "I think he's a second year, but I'm not sure." She frowned- "So you think this gal murdered Kazu-kun?"

"It's looking that way," Shinjuurou said. "She was the last person that we know of to see him alive, at any rate."

"So prime suspect number one, then?" Watanabi chuckled grimly. "Well, she's a bit different from Kazu-kun's type. He usually went after dark haried girls." She slapped a hand against the sketch- "This has her with red hair. Kazu-kun usually avoided them like the plague."

"Any reason why?" Rie asked.

"He just didn't like the color," Watanabi shrugged, "thought it was always dyed."

"So, what exactly made you and Atsuhiko..." I asked, "You know!"

"Well, now that is a long and complicated story," Watanabi smirked. "See, it all goes back to the application exams..."

**5:29 P.M.**

I found myself walking down the hallways from Rika's Lab to the front doors, instead of to the clubroom, for a change.

I had just checked up on Yukimura to see how she was doing, and seeing that she hadn't been bothered all day, I was now heading home, mulling over the events of the last few days rather absentmindedly when I suddenly ran into the Student Council Treasurer, Yusa, Aoi.

I mean 'ran into' about as literally as possible.

She couldn't see where she was going with that massive stack of boxes in her arms, and I, having been caught up in my thoughts, had failed to see her coming as well.

"Wah!" Yusa yelped in surprise- and the boxes seemed about ready to topple over at that moment had I not reached out to help catch them. "Sorry! Sorry!"

"It's alright," I said, and helped relieve her of half of those massive boxes- which weighed quite alot, actually. "I wasn't paying attention to where I was going."

And then the red haired, red eyed girl before me- in the same class as Sena, but still somehow managing to be a lot shorter than most girls her age- looked up in surprise at her 'rescuer.' "H-Hasegawa-Ani-Do-San!" What a completely odd flustering up of honorfics.

"You need some help with these?" I asked, referring to the boxes.

"Er-um-I-" Yusa's face went red for some reason- "Sure!" She seemed to blurt out before even thinking things through.

Sigh. I really hope things don't get too out of hand with her too.

"So where to?" I asked.

"T-The, ah...storage room!" It was cute how she tried to correct her earlier floundering.

"Right then," I said, and let her lead the way.

We walked in silence for a time- before Yusa spoke up.

"Why are you being so nice!?" She asked so suddenly and with such emotion that I had no clue what she was talking about.

"Hah?"

"You climbed a bell tower to stop someone from jumping! There's nothing delinquent in that at all!"

...Wait, what?

"There weren't even any rumors about you being involved with that guy's death!"

"Oi, Yusa, I don't know what you're going on about, but that's-"

"And now here you are helping me out carrying these boxes!" Yusa continued on- making me seriously regret trying to help her out for a few single moments. "Why did you even ask!? That's nothing a delinquent would do! Why are you acting so nice!? It's completely counter to your character thus far! People might get the wrong idea about you, and start the rumors that you might actually be a nice guy!"

I stopped in my tracks and stared at her.

"Yusa," I said rather flatly, "I think you've got the wrong idea about me."

"But there's no way Sena would fall for someone nice! She's just not into those people!" Yusa continued to rant on, ignorant of my words. "You can't be a nice guy! You bleach your hair! You wear your shirt untucked in! Your club is a fucking Harem!"

"It's actually not-" I said, despite my sudden, horrific realization that what she just said was true.

"WHY AREN'T YOU THE DELINQUENT I DREAM ABOUT?!" Yusa was suddenly yelling- and I had no clue what the hell was wrong with her, or why the hallway temperature suddenly dropped ten degrees. "WHY AREN'T YOU RAVISHING ME HERE IN THE HALLWAY!?" Suddenly- she'd dropped the boxes she was carrying and was lunging at me- "KISS ME! FUCK ME! TEAR MY CLOTHES OFF! BE ROUGH!"

This was completely out of character for what I knew of this girl- and it was only the boxes that she'd once been carrying that prevented something even worse from happening.

Mid lunge towards me, her arms were outstretched in a certain way. I dropped the boxes and Yusa caught them with timing that bordered on the miraculous.

"Bwuh?" She suddenly blinked in confusion at the extra weight.

I'll admit it.

I took the opportunity to run.

I ran so fast that I was slamming the door to Rika's lab shut behind me that there was a double sonic boom three seconds after I started running.

Rika looked up from her desk then- fake glasses having cracks in them as she spun around in confusion- "Kodaka? What the hell!? Did you just teleport in here!?"

I think it was at that moment that I collapsed to the ground and blacked out.


	5. My charade is the Event of the Season

**CHAPTER 4: "My charade is the Event of the Season."**

**MONDAY. 5:27 P.M.**

"Thank you for your time!" I said as I escorted the last of the teaching staff out of the room. I let out a sigh as soon as the door was closed. "Well that was a waste of time."

"They were all so tight lipped about everything," Rie agreed. "We didn't even get a name for that student..."

"Looks like we'll have to get Katawase to pull those strings, then," I grumbled.

"It's a shame that conspiracy seems to be the-" Kazamori was going to say more when Inga, who had been resting his head in his arms on the table, suddenly shot upright, eyes darting left to right in confusion. "Inga?" Kazamori asked, "Is everything alright?"

"I felt it," Inga said, limbs trembling, body suddenly shaking.

"Felt what?" I'm not liking the rather familiar shaking there. Please don't say what I think you're about to say...

"Someone just used my transformation powers," Inga said as he bolted for the door- suddenly filled with energy. "SHE'S HERE!"

Rie and Kazamori both nodded at me without saying a word- and I ran after Inga who was practically howling like a bloodhound.

**"Stop."**

Kodaka Hasegawa and Aoi Yusa stopped in their tracks in the hallway.

"You will not remember this encounter after I leave," said a woman who wore the same clothes as Inga's adult form as she slipped out from the shadows behind them- her bare feet slapping silently against the polished floor as she circled around, and knelled down in front of Yusa- meeting red eyes with green. "Now answer me, girl..." There was a faint glow of pink across both eyes. "What is your business with this boy? What makes you desire him?" That glow of violet light started to emanate from the Woman's mouth- "Tell me, what is it that you long to hide from him? What is-?"

"YUUKO!"

The connection between the woman and Yusa was broken- and the woman stood up in annoyance. "Why does that voice sound familiar?" She asked aloud- and then turned her head over her shoulder- letting that red hair fall to the side. "What...?"

There- standing at the end of the hallway- was Inga- arms to the side, panting heavily from the long run, hands clenched into fists, and eyes narrowed in anger.

And right behind him was me, scowling at her.

"Well well well," the woman said, "if it isn't the Defeated Detective and... is that _me_? How is that even possible?" She looked completely baffled.

"You mean you don't know?" I asked.

"You'll have to fill me in. I'm afraid my memories of the past two months have been quite jumbled up, for some reason..." Yuuko said with a nonchalant tone- although her eyes narrowed at Inga across the hallway. "Although, I'd think I'd remember something as strange as to split me into two bodies."

"First, you tell us what you were doing to that girl just now," I ordered.

"Oh, this li'l thing?" Yuuko smirked as she held a hand back to stroke at Yusa's chin. "I was getting hungry...also, I seem to have a thing against Red-heads now... Don't know why, but her hair absolutely pisses me off."

"So you were going to eat her entire soul, then?" Inga asked, growling slightly.

"You do seem testy, don't you," Yuuko narrowed her eyes. "What ever has gotten into you, Me?"

"It's what _**got out**_ of me that you should be concerned about," Inga said. "Because you're going straight back to where you came from!"

"No," She said.

"What do you mean, 'no'?" I asked.

"That damned contract...being liberated from it through whatever means..." Yuuko continued on- "I'm never going back to that. The whole soul is just so much more satisfying!"

"You killed Atsuhiko, Hirokazu then," I deduced.

"If you mean that pervert from Friday?" Yuuko smirked, "Then yes. And he was delicious in every single aspect of himself...body _and_ soul."

"First: Ew." Inga was quite visibly squicked out by that, and I was too, then said: "Second: Then that's exactly why you need to surrender now, or else I'm going to have to bring you back under control by force!"

"Like hell I'm going to be restrained by you anymore!" Yuuko snarled; and with that, she suddenly exploded into a burst of violet light and dark purple butterflies- dashing down the hallway straight towards Shinjuurou and Inga.

"RRAAAAAAAH!" Inga leaped through the cloud of butterflies- managing to snag one by the wings with his teeth even as I ducked to the side.

The cloud of Butterflies yelled out in surprised pain as Inga sucked the captured butterfly into his mouth and bit down on it hard.

The cloud- having lost some vital piece of itself- exploded into various directions.

Several large chunks flew into the ventilation systems- others escaped through the windows- and the remaining pieces vanished into the cracks in the walls and floors.

I looked to Inga and asked- "Did you get her?"

Inga swallowed the butterfly down- and scowled- "No. I just spooked her for a bit. That wasn't enough to pull her back inside...but..." He growled- "I got the name of one of Her next targets." He turned to run- "We've gotta get going- Watanabi-chan's in trouble!"

**"What?!" I followed after Inga.**

As they left the line-of-sight of Kodaka and Yusa, the two students suddenly resumed walking without realizing that something strange had just happened.

And then Yusa opened her mouth.

**6:14 P.M.**

There had been a loud slamming sound and then Kodaka-sempai had appeared in the brilliant light of a Teleport! BUT! So strained from his sudden technological feat was he that Kodaka-sempai fell asleep!

So the Brave Scientist Rika took him to the back room and left him lying on the floor- for there were no beds, and it was really the best she could do due to the fact that he was quite heavy and Rika could not carry him to the Nurse's office like he once had...

And so Rika waited for Kodaka-sempai to wake up, and then he did! "What happened?" Rika asked of him.

"Yusa 'confessed' to me out of nowhere," Kodaka-sempai said with much concern! Or was it confusion? Rika couldn't tell!

"Confessed?" Rika asked Kodaka-sempai, "Confessed what?"

"She wanted me to...ah...well..." Kodaka-Sempai then said exactly what happened in such a concise way that Rika could never quote it properly! Rika was so caught off guard by this sudden revelation of another girl's heart that she...she...! Oh screw it!

Do you know how hard it is to think in third person all the time!? GOD, how in-character can a girl get trying to do a running narration of her thoughts and then scramble them all to bits by tripping over one damned word!?

"Hello? Earth to Rika?" And there goes Kodaka-Sempai waving his hand in front of my face. "I didn't break your brain or anything, did I?"

"No, I'm just..." Stumbling for words inside my head, "processing it all.."

I wasn't sure what to say after that. I'm not sure Kodaka-sempai knew either.

"It seems our everyday lives aren't quite stable yet, are they?"

I wasn't sure which of us said it- but it summarized everything nicely.

"So where's Yukimura?" Kodaka-sempai asked, much to my confusion.

"Hah? Yukimura left with you, Sempai," I told him.

"No, she stayed behind in here," Kodaka frowned- and I did too.

"Yukimura definitely left with you," I insisted. "I remember you two stepping out of the room together and Yukimura bowing as you closed the door."

"Eh?" I didn't like that sound- "I left the lab alone. Yukimura said she was staying behind to help...with..." Kodaka-sempai's frown got deeper, "That's weird... I can't remember what it was she said she was staying behind to help with. But I definitely remember her saying she was staying, and then...I closed the door and I think the next thing I remember was running into Yusa-san. But that was half-way to the school entrance!"

What could cause such a large discrepancy of memory?

"This is quite worrying, Kodaka-sempai!" I said as I thought it over, "We've lost track of Yukimura and you've got a memory problem!"

**6:30 P.M.**

Just outside the school gates, Watanabi frowned as footsteps echoed her own- and then stopped at the same moment she stopped walking.

With a sudden twist around- Watanabi turned on her follower... "Alright- what's the bright idea-!?"

It was Yuuko- licking her lips.

"Wh-Wha'd'ya want, lady!?"

"You talked to Shinjuurou earlier," Yuuko said as a matter of fact.

"Eh? The detective?" Watanabi asked, "What about him!?"

"Tell me...Exactly everything that you told _**Him**_."

**The brilliant flash of purple light briefly turned the orange sky of the setting sun on its head.**

Shinjuurou growled- "Damn it, we're too late...!"

We ran to the main gate, and then...came crashing to a halt as we found a small crowd some students helping up the girl who was lying on the ground, looking to all the world as if she had just suffered a fainting spell- but they way her eyes looked...

"Wh...who am I?" Watanabi asked of everyone around her.

It was as if a large portion of her memories had been stolen away.

"Damn it..." I breathed heavily- "DAMN IT!"

This was not good. Not good at all.

**"Matsuda-kun?" asked an unfamiliar voice not moments later.**

Matsuda, Buriki turned around in his apartment bedroom in surprise and horror- "What the?!" he gasped "You!"

The woman before him was the same one who had killed Hirokazu!

"Me," She said with a devilish smile.

"You're the witch!" He declared loudly, trying to distract from his reaching for his cellphone.

"Witch?" Yuuko pouted somewhat- "Sorry, but that's not quite the right term."

"W-what are you then!?" Matsuda yelled as he hit the speed dial for the Police- "How did you get inside my apartment!?"

"I'm a Demon," She smirked- "And you don't have any Devil's Traps or Salt..."

"So what...you killed Kazu. Now you're coming to kill me?" He asked.

"Oh, I wouldn't have thought of it had I not learned something interesting today..." Yuuko smirked evily- "Sadly, you're never going to find out what that is."

**Shinjuurou's Cellphone rang as we walked up the hallway towards the office that we'd been running questionings in.**

"Yeah!?" Shinjuurou answered in a tired voice.

_"Matsuda just called,"_ Katawase said in an reversely hurried voice. _"Yuuko was in his apartment- we've got squad cars and an ambulance on dispatch, but going by the sounds we just heard...!"_

"Damn it- So she was distracting us!" Shinjuurou growled.

_"What?" _Katawase asked.

"Yuuko! We just ran into her trying to eat some kid's soul out of the middle of the hallway-" Shinjuurou explained- "Inga managed to get the name of one of her targets, and we tried to stop her, but... a girl just got her memories eaten at the main gate."

_"Wait- this just happened?"_ Katawase asked.

"Yeah," Shinjuurou replied.

_"How the hell did she get across town so fast?"_

"She could split up into this big cloud of butterflies-" Shinjuurou remarked even as we entered the room and he closed the door behind us, "I'm not surprised she didn't just split herself up into those to teleport there instantly after she ate our witness' memories."

"I'm really starting to hate it when my own powers are being used against me!" I yelled out in frustration.

**The corpse hit the floor with a thud.**

Yuuko licked her lips absently as she surveyed the soulless husk of a man before her- she would have preferred it if she had the time to properly enjoy her meal, but, sadly...

"Beggars can't be choosers," She lamented- and burst away into a shower of butterflies as police sirens began to be audible.

Not a minute later, the door to the apartment was kicked inwards- and police swarmed into the apartment.

"...We just got to Matsuda's apartment," Katawase said with a grim tone, as she looked down upon the dead body on the floor. "He's toasted like Atsuhiko."

_"Damn it,"_ Shinjuurou swore over the line.

"That's two bodies, now," Katawase asked, "what about the other kids?"

_"Watanabi's lost her entire life memories- I think Yuuko was in a rush to find something out, and didn't eat her whole soul,"_ Shinjuurou said, _"but the other kids are fine. We interrupted Yuuko's first attempt."_

"So I write that off as Attempted Murder," Katawase said, then said, "hold for a sec'," before switching to an all important Police Dispatch Number, and began speaking. "This is Chief Katawase, Mayoi, ordering a change on the all points bulletin on the suspect we only know by name of "Yuuko", Y, U, U, K, O. She's to be considered armed and extremely dangerous. Suspect has committed two murders with an unknown technique so far, and is to be charged with Attempted Murder of two more high school students if she can be apprehended. Do not, I repeat _**DO NOT**_ confront if spotted!"

**With that, she switched back to Shinjuurou's line.**

_"I've put an A.P.B. out on her. If Yuuko shows her face, we'll know."_

"Somehow," I said with a frown as I stared at a growling Inga, "I have the feeling that Yuuko won't display _that_ face unless she wants us to find her."

**7:09 P.M.**

We'd spent the last half hour searching the school, only to return to the lab to find Yukimura in the back room, sleeping soundly as if she'd been there the entire time...

Which she had been.

"How did we miss that she was here?" I asked.

"I..." Rika frowned- "Rika doesn't know, Sempai. It's a mystery! Maybe we were just caught up in that whole Yusa-Confession thing?"

"Probably," I said.

**7:51 P.M.**

**The Drive back to the new apartment was a long and silent one.**

Kazamori and Inga sat in the back seat as I pulled up to the parking lot and turned the car off with a sigh.

"Well, today went just about as well as I could've thought it might have," I said after a moment.

"We'll need to go over what Watanabi-chan said again," Rie said softly, "maybe we missed something..."

"Kazamori recorded everything, right?" I asked as I went to get out of the car.

"I did," Kazamori spoke up- "it's on the laptop."

"Great," I waited for everyone else to get out so I could lock the car up. "And Inga, maybe something in that memory fragment you got off of her might shed some light on this..."

Inga said nothing as he got out of the car.

Kazamori looked over at Inga in surprise, "Inga?"

Inga grit his teeth, but refused to say anything, instead opting to angrily slam the car door shut behind him.

I think even Rie felt that there was something off about this, "Hey, Inga, is everything...?"

"NO! EVERYTHING IS NOT ALRIGHT!" Inga snapped right at that moment, pointing at his chest as he yelled, "A _**PIECE**_ of me is out there killing people! No...Not even a piece. The **REAL ME** who I used to be is out there KILLING again! And here I am- just the _**restraint**_ without anything to hold back!"

"Inga?" My eyes widened slightly at that remark.

"I'm COMPLETELY USELESS anymore!" Inga continued on- "I lost my powers- No, I never even had them to begin with! I'm just a shell that was made to hold someone else back and now I don't even have THAT anymore because that person is out there causing chaos everywhere!" And then a thought hit him then, and he then yelled: "Bettenou!? I had the wrong idea about that! She never laid a trap for _**me**_ to give up my powers. _***I***_ Laid a _**FUCKING TRAP**_ for _***ME***_ to give up my powers so that they could go on and get a life of their own!" and then he ran his hands through his hair as he yelled: _**"AND I FELL FOR IT LIKE AN **_***IDIOT!*"**

"What...?" Kazamori took a step backwards, her eyes widening and watering as he said that.

"I tricked myself into thinking that I had different powers- I deluded myself into thinking I needed to get those powers under control...!" Inga continued on ranting, crying even as he said these things, "I KNEW THAT I'D CAUSE TROUBLE JUST BY DOING THAT VERY THING!"

"That's..." Rie frowned- something about the way he was talking now just didn't sound _right._

"_I __**INTENTIONALLY**__ HANDICAPPED US BY LOCKING ME OUT OF MY POWERS AND TURNING KAZAMORI HUMAN!"_ Inga seemed to conclude with that point.

Everything went silent for a few moments- and then Kazamori sniffed loudly.

Al of our attention went towards Kazamori as she slid to her knees and began to wail.

"Y...You Big IDIOT!" Kazamori yelled at him.

As Rie started to move over towards Kazamori, Inga realized in that moment what he'd done. I'd never seen him look so confused and hurt than in that moment.

"Inga...!" Rie called out and reached for his shoulder.

But by then it was too late.

Inga was already running off into the distance, crying himself as he continued to berate himself.

_"I am! I'm such a fucking IDIOT!"_

I moved to chase after him, but Rie just grabbed my arm and said, "We need to get Kazamori inside..."

"Right..."

Inga was already gone. There was no way I could catch him now anyways...


	6. Carry On My Wayward Son

**CHAPTER 5. "Carry on My Wayward Son."**

Ironically, it began to rain soon after that.

As Kazamori's tears fell, so did the heavens open up to pour down upon the world.

I had no idea how it had come to this moment, but here I was, wandering the world in silence getting drenched with rain.

At some point, I'd slowed down to a walk.

Didn't matter.

A car drove past- and I got splashed with water.

It really didn't matter.

What had I done?

I've probably screwed things up royally with Kazamori. There's no denying that much.

I don't know how long I walked for, or where I even was when it happened...

But I suddenly ran into a familiar face.

"Inga!?"

It was An Osada... holding an umbrella as she walked through the rain for some reason or another.

"Come on, let's get you inside...!"

Wait, where was I?

It was the Osada Mansion.

Somehow I'd ran to this place from Shinjuurou's apartment.

"What happened?" An was asking a lot of other things besides that, but I'm pretty sure that was the gist of it.

I wasn't even paying attention as she had one of the servants take me into the bathroom to get cleaned up.

I wasn't even paying attention when I got brought over to a dinner table to get something to eat.

...Was that chandelier shaped like a globe...?

It's funny how sometimes you just move the motions without even thinking, how sometimes you just... live without even thinking. You'll focus on the strangest things.

But, by that point, I was just in shock of what I'd just said.

I'd read once that it's a dangerous spiral- this 'depression' thing.

I suppose I'm fortunate enough that An was the one to catch me out of that downwards spiral.

_**SLAP.**_

"STOP IGNORING ME AND TELL ME WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON, INGA!" An yelled after I'd thoroughly ignored her for what was probably...?

Where was a clock?

Didn't matter.

I didn't even know what time I'd gotten here.

"I screwed up."

"You...what?"

"I screwed up...with Kazamori."

"..._Oh_."

She...actually seemed surprised?

"I hurt her," I said, "I...it's..."

Screw it.

"We ran into Yuuko-" I said- "the other me who I can't become anymore."

And...I just...I spilled it out.

Everything that had happened up to that point.

I don't know how many times I rubbed the tears out of my eyes or how much more I ended up just sobbing instead of talking...

But, An...She just listened to it all.

"...Yup," She said finally, "you screwed up alright." She sighed, "Inga, look, I'm not going to pretend to know what's going on with this mystical magic gumbo jumbo stuff. I'm just a girl who couldn't be a singer...But I know one thing."

"What's that?"

"If you didn't actually love this girl deep down in your heart, you wouldn't be so torn up about this right now."

"What?"

"Way I see it, it doesn't matter if you got her knocked up or even if you two weren't even dating up until this point. You love Kazamori, and that's all there is to it."

"But I'm just a..."

"Shell? No way. Shells don't feel 'regret' or 'remorse' or anything like that." An looked like she was ready to slap me again. "A Shell wouldn't spend five hours walking in the rain to come stand at my doorstep looking for someone to talk to."

"Five hours!?" Did that mean it was...?

"Yes, five hours," An said with a nod- "and no, we're not discussing that right now!"

"...Ok." I didn't want to get slapped again.

"Look, Inga. I don't care if you or Kazamori weren't anything but human as of a few months ago, every time I see you two together, it's so painfully obvious that you two like each other. But you're just being stubborn by not admitting it!"

"We do too...!"

"When's the last time you told her "I Love You," in those exact words?"

"..."

"When's the last time _she_ told _you_ "I Love You," in those exact words?"

"..."

"Uh huh. Thought so." And then she was nodding.

"What's that supposed to mean!?" I asked rather indignantly.

"You two are at that awkward stage where you're trying to figure out what to do with each other after you've gone and had sex and now have a kid on the way. You've pretty much skipped every single date between 'being friends' and going straight to 'lovers' and now you're both not sure where you stand with each other."

That was actually pretty accurate, all things considered.

"So here's what we're going to do. You'll stay here the night and I'm going to teach you everything there is to know about _apologizing._ And before you say 'no', there's no way I'm letting you back out into _**that**_ weather."

As if to prove another thing I'd been good at ignoring this entire time, there was a sudden howl of wind outside as what sounded like a bucket-full of water hit a window.

"Ouch..." I said.

"Yeah, I hope the garden survives this," An said with a look that clearly screamed 'Plotting!' "If it does, you're definitely taking some of those Violets back with you. Kazamori said she liked those last time she was over."

"Violets?"

"Sigh. Lesson one, Kiddo. Your girlfriend has a favorite flower. Learn it and memorize it!"

"G-Got it."

And so An Osada's night-time boot camp of "The art of Apology" began.

**Kazamori had fallen asleep.**

I sat there on the couch stroking at Kazamori's hair while Shinjuurou hung up the phone and walked over.

"Well, that was An," he said after he sat down.

"Did she...?" I didn't even finish the question.

"She did," He nodded- that was a relief, "and she's drilling him on 'make up dates' now."

"You know, now that I think about it, we've gone out on more dates this last month than they have."

"Which is why An's teaching him how to make _**chocolate**_ next."

"Oh dear..."

"Don't worry, she's prepared for a mess."

Kato slipped up onto the couch and curled up next to Kazamori then- purring softly to comfort her in her sleep.

That silent trembling that I'd gotten used to over the last hour suddenly seemed to calm down a bit.

"I hope things work out for them," I said. "I really do."

"Well, we'll know soon enough, I suppose," Shinjuurou said, and I nodded at that.

Tomorrow morning. Something surely unique would happen then.

"Honestly," Shinjuurou began, "I'm concerned that Yuuko might have actually planned this as a way to escape, and that Inga was wrong about not being able to bring her back entirely."

"Something doesn't seem right about that though," I said. "Didn't you say that Yuuko had no clue what happened to make them split apart?"

"She certainly seemed surprised, that's for sure."

"Okay, so correct me on this, but wasn't Inga just possessing Yuuko's body, and then shape shifting into his kid form, rather than there being two separate bodies?"

"Yeah."

"And Inga's the sole owner of that body now, isn't he?"

"...Yeah."

"So how is Yuuko able to manifest separately now? Shouldn't that be impossible?"

"I think I see what you're getting at," Shinjuurou frowned, but the glimmer in his eyes said all the thanks needed.

"So if Inga has the original body, then it can't be Yuuko's body herself out there causing trouble, can it?" I deduced.

"That's right, she can't possibly be the same body...she's just memories...a soul." He looked at me with concern- "Yuuko's possessing someone else. That would explain why her face and age is different."

"Someone at the school, obviously," I agreed, "or else we wouldn't have run into her there."

"So who? A student?"

"Probably. That'd explain the age difference too. Atsuhiko might have accidentally stumbled on that secret identity, and Yuuko killed him for it to prevent him from causing any trouble." I frowned, "Could it be a teacher though?"

"A teacher would make a lot of sense. They'd have a lot more reason to remain hidden because of that."

"But then why go after Watanabi and Matsuda?"

"Why leave Watanabi alive, and deep fry Matsuda?"

I snapped my fingers- "Information and Control."

"What?"

"We're assuming that Yuuko's just a collection of memories for now, right? What if they're only fragments of memories and not the _**whole**_ memories?"

"Inga swallowed one of Yuuko's memories to get that bit of relevant information." And then there was a look of horror. "Inga said it was just a brief glimpse, not nearly enough to pull her back in, but...what if Inga's rant earlier wasn't his thoughts but _**Yuuko's?"**_

"That's exactly what I'm thinking. The way it just came over him all of a sudden... I'm pretty sure that was one of Yuuko's memories surfacing." And then I went into the core of my theory: "I think Yuuko can't remember how to use her powers correctly. The deep-frying might be a completely hit or miss thing! There's no telling how many other people she's fed on and lived."

"So those students might have lived even if we hadn't interrupted them," Shinjuurou thought for a while, then spoke again. "We need to figure out who Yuuko's possessing, though."

"It can wait until tomorrow." A yawn pierced the whole sentence. "I think we should all get to bed."

"That's as good of an idea as any..." And then Shinjuurou yawned too. Hehe...

**The Next Morning, I woke up alone, like I had for the past week.**

Unlike when I was an R.A.I., waking up is something confusing to me now. The defined points of "shut down" and "start up" are no-longer applicable.

Instead- you drift seemingly from one moment to another in your dreams, and then wake up sometimes without even realizing that you've fallen asleep.

Such as what happened just mere moments ago.

I had been on the couch crying over what Inga had said and...now...

I was in my own bed.

Alone.

I believe I'd already said that.

That initial moment of confusion leads you to start off with a fresh mind- supposedly.

Instead, it just made my heart ache even more.

A heart.

R.A.I.'s had been programed with human thinking, but not emotions.

How did humans live with such things? Fear- anger- hate- sorrow- regret.

Hope.

Happiness.

A longing desire for a returned presence.

I stepped out of the room and into the main bulk of the apartment.

Kato purred from the counter.

"A reasonable compromise."

We hadn't even been able to name a Cat-toaster properly without arguing.

In the end, we had settled on figuring out the Cat's gender and choosing a name off of that.

And _**that**_ had gotten a neighbor's toaster cat pregnant as a result.

I looked forward to seeing what toaster-kittens looked like, but at the same time...

Where was our impulse control?

As an R.A.I., I...I'll admit that I hadn't been the best at acting rationally.

It's a risk of emulating human thought, I suppose, but now I wasn't even emulating it.

My mind had been rearranged so drastically that suddenly being...being...

Just simply being.

I suppose.

Adding onto that the complications involved with being pregnant...

What a foolish experiment that had been. Surely there could have been something else that we could have tried see if Inga's powers had changed any.

But no- we had gone straight for that risk.

I...it wasn't something either of us were prepared for, I know now.

There was always that deep-seeded thought that what we had done was a mistake, deep within my mind... Had Inga felt the same way...?

"Ah, Kazamori!" Rie said- happily cooking away at something on the stove while Shinjuurou stared on in...abstract horror, if I'm reading his facial expression correctly."Good morning!"

I was eating my own breakfast soon enough while Rie continued with some sort of food experiment involving pancakes with bacon strips inside the batter...

I have no clue whether or not to congratulate her on coming up with such an odd concoction.

Regardless, Shinjuurou explained Rie's theory about Inga's alter self being a fragmented spirit, and that a piece of that memory might have slipped through into Inga's from the fragment he'd eaten.

I wasn't sure if that made me comfortable with the ideas of forgiving him for running off or not.

**I, Mayoi Katawase, am not amused.**

"You're telling me," I said flatly to Max The Coroner, "that Matsuda here literally had the breath knocked out of him?" I pointed at the body that looked like a dried prune. "That guy? _Choked_ to death?"

"The body's mummified state arose within moments of death, but yes," Max adjusted his glasses, "the cause of death was a lack of oxygen due to a lack of oxygen."

"Right right right." I asked, "So what about Atsuhiko?"

"That was caused by quite a similar asphyxiation, identical in all respects save for one."

"And that's...?"

"Matsuda's lungs were turned inside out into the airways."

What the ever loving chocolate fudge-cake?

"...Care to repeat that?" I had to ask even though I didn't want to.

"All of the oxygen in both of our victims lungs was missing- however," Max pulled open Matsuda's dehydrated chest, revealing the ghastly sight of inverted lungs, "Matsuda died due to the oxygen being pulled out of his lungs at an incredibly fast rate. Atsuhiko's lungs, on the other hand were flattened, as if slowly drained of oxygen."

"So...We're dealing with a madwoman with a vacuum cleaner," I mused.

"Even modern vacuum cleaners would struggle to be able to pull this off, Chief Katawase," Max said. "The result is something more like explosive decompression. Although how that would be caused in a human being is-"

"It's a figure of speech, Max!" I rubbed at the bridge of my nose.

Good grief this guy could be dense sometimes.

"Sorry, but something like this is a rare sight. If possible, I'd like to see how this was accomplished and-"

"Trust me, Max, you really don't."

My cell phone rang as I exited the morgue.

"Chief Katawase," I answered.

_"F.Y.I., Inga's back now,"_ Shinjuurou said. _"So you can call off that APB on him if you haven't already."_

"Good to know, anything else?" I asked.

_"We think Yuuko's possessing a student or teacher at St. Chronica's, probably a student than teach, and that she's just a bunch of fragmented memories held together by magic powers, but other than that, no, not really."_

Well that was an awkward sentence.

_"How's it going on your end?"_

"Official cause of Matsuda's death is having his lungs sucked out through his throat," I offered that tasty tidbit.

_"Considering how souls usually come out of a person, I can't say I'm surprised."_

He didn't sound surprised either.

"So what's the plan for dealing with Yuuko?" I asked.

_"Don't have one yet,"_ Shinjuurou replied, sounding somewhat distracted, _"we're going to go over Watanabi's testimony after lunch to see if there's anything we missed."_

"Should I put eyes on the school?"

_"Yeah, that's a smart idea."_

And with that, we said our farewells, and hung up.

Becoming Police Chief had changed how most people looked at me now.

Every single time I stepped into the main office room, everyone would stand up from their desks and salute.

"Back to work everyone! And stop doing that, please!"

Didn't matter that I'd told 'em to cut it out a thousand times by now. They just kept on doing it.

I sat down at my desk, and opened up the email page. Gah! "...so much junk mail...!" Ignoring that, though, i went and sent out an email to dispatch to get surveillance put on St. Chronica Academy.

Of course, the moment I finished that, a knock came at my door. "Yeah?" I motioned the poor lieutenant in.

"They're bringing in a body that just washed up at the harbor," he said.

"I take it there's a reason you're telling me beyond us having another corpse for the corpse party?" I asked.

"...You need to see it."

"Damn." I followed the poor Lieutenant down to the morgue once more...

"Jane Doe, age unknown," Max was speaking into a tape recorder as I walked into the room, detailing the body on the table before he began to cut into it, "Damage: what appears to be sword wounds to the stomach and neck, inflicted before death. Hands, feet, and most limbs removed, likely post-death. There are minor bite wounds, also likely post-death..."

And the case changed entirely.

"Like previous victims Matsuda and Atsuhiko, Jane Doe shows signs of rapid dehydration and mummification prior to being dumped into the water. Many body parts seem to have been removed post-death as a means of obscuring the woman's identity, with the wounds crudely sewn up again in an attempt to hide this. Missing organs were likely tossed into the water elsewhere, probably devoured already by indigenous life... It's impossible to tell if cause of death was caused by asphyxiation due to a lack of lungs inside the body."

"Max," I spoke up then, "How long would you say she's been in the water?"

Max paused slightly, then spoke up, "Based on the water temperature, and state of decay on the skin, I would say Jane Doe has been deceased for a little over one week."

"Thank you, Max!" I turned to leave immediately, brushing past the poor Lieutenant as I pulled out my phone and hit a speed dial number...

Only to get voice mail.

Damn it.

"Yo, Detective, we've got another body. A Jane Doe, 'bout a week old, been in the water for the whole time. We need to talk 'A Sap.'"

Just what was going on over there that he wasn't answering all of a sudden?

**Back in time by (more than) a few minutes...**

"Inga," Kazamori breathed once she saw what the boy was presenting her.

Two whole heart shaped boxes filled with assorted chocolate pieces (I've got to admit, I'm impressed that Inga managed to pull off making that much) and a whole boquet of Violets (Did he get those from An's garden?).

"I'm sorry, Kazamori!" Inga, it should be noted, really looked decent when he cleaned up and wore something other than his usual outfit. Said something happened to be a tuxedo that looked to have been recently sized to fit him.

I spared An a glance out of the corner of my eye, and she just smiled in return as she chatted with Rie.

"I'm really sorry for everything I said- I was being completely out of line and I wasn't thinking at all!" On the other hand, you could argue that he'd been thinking way too much. "So...I'd just like to ask...if it's alright with you...could we-"

And then Kato jumped into one of the boxes of chocolates and spilled it over.

"AH! NO! Bad Cat!" I'm pretty sure we all yelled that in that single moment.

While we all rushed to pick up the spilled candy- Kato sneakily absconded with the other box without spilling a single piece.

It should be noted that after the following incident, it was posted to the internet that Toaster Cats should never be allowed to have chocolate.

The smell of burnt chocolate alone is enough to make you understand why, let alone the fact that- much like a normal flesh and blood dog- Toaster Cats seem to be incapable of ingesting chocolate without experiencing discomfort.

(Spoiler alert: It was the veterinarian we took Kato to who posted said warning of toaster-cats and chocolate onto the internet.)

**But Meanwhile in the present...**

Meh. Whatever it was that was happening, it was probably important.

I took advantage of everyone standing up to turn to bow this time to make an announcement; "Alright everyone! I want search teams out in the harbor dredging up every inch of that pond! We've likely got multiple bodies out there, so I want them found before the fishes do! Ya got that?"

"Yes, Ma'am!" Ah- and there was a row of saluting.

I could get used to the saluting.

**Hours later, I'd still not heard back from Shinjuurou.**

But that was alright, he wasn't missing much right now.

I took a sip of coffee, then took a bite out of a doughnut as the sunlight of the mid-afternoon sun reflected off of my sunglasses.

'Yeah, that's pretty cool looking,' everyone's thinking whenever they spare me a glance. It's mostly the citizens on the other side of the police line doing the glancing though.

That's right, Citizens! I wear the shades 'cuz I'm the Chief!

So far, only two bodies had been found in the harbor- the one that had surfaced this morning, and another about half an hour ago- little more than shark chow, though.

To be honest, we'd lucked out that the first body hadn't been eaten up like that one.

But this didn't make any sense at all.

Why would Yuuko go to the trouble of hiding bodies at first, only to leave Atsuhiko's out in the open? Was it the distance? Had she been too far from her usual dumping ground?

But then there was the teleporting across town she'd performed yesterday...

It was right around then that the second body was finally dredged up from the harbor with a mighty splash.

"Well," I said as I adjusted my sunglasses, "I think we've just thoroughly cannon-balled Yuuko's day."

"YEEEEEEAAAAAAAH!" A kid on the other side of the caution line yelled.

I couldn't help but to flash a thumbs up and a grin at the kid, even as his parents scolded him for being loud.

Yup. Made his day, that I did.

**Back at the Morgue...**

"Victim is male, John Doe, same removal of internal organs as before on the Jane Doe and from the partial remains of the third, unidentified victim," Max read off the list of injuries nearly identical to the Jane Doe's.

It was about that point that my cell phone rang again.

"Yo, Shinjuurou, you've missed out on quite the day," I said before the Detective could even speak. "How goes the research?"

_"Not at all. We just got back from the vet."_

"Oh?" I gave off a "Hue Hue Hue!" and said, "It sounds like you've had an eventful day yourself!"

_"You could say that. What's this about a Jane Doe?"_

"Jane-chan, John-kun, and Same-Chum," I giggled at my own little joke. "Shark-Chum" Hahah!

"Three!?" Wow, Shinjuurou actually sounded surprised.

"Yeah, seems li'l ol' Yuuko's been a busy little butterfly," I said. "We're still dredging the harbor in case we missed anything."

_"So...any ID on the new bodies?"_

"What part of the Theme naming did you not understand? We've got nothing on 'em."

_"Ouch. You sound a bit irritated there..."_

"You would be too if your double murder investigation just turned into a quintuple homicide."

_"How old are they?"_

"There's not enough of ol' Chummy to tell, but Jane and John are a little over a week old, best Max can tell."

_"Max?"_

"The Coroner."

_"Oh, right." _He paused, then said, _"So a week? That lines up almost exactly with Atsuhiko's murder."_

"I take it that means whatever Yuuko's been doing since she split from Inga, she's either been doing it quietly, or..."

_"Or she only regained consciousness around one week ago."_

"You've got a theory on that part, right?"

_"Oh, right, I don't think I told you about it earlier, did I?"_

"Depends, I might've forgotten. Lay it on me anyways." Busy day for everyone, that's for sure.

_"Rie and I have a running theory that Yuuko is just a bunch of splintered memory fragments slowly pulling themselves back together."_

"I think I heard that part...but then again..." I shook my head, "Never mind. So you think the late wake-up-call has to do with this too?"

_"If Yuuko's slowly been recollecting herself, then by the time she formed enough to be able to wake up and be able to siphon souls to sustain herself...It might have happened a little over one week ago."_

"So now we're looking for a trigger incident," I sighed. "Great, Shinjuurou. Just great. Do you know how much trouble those are to pin down?"

_"About as hard as Lynch Pins, I'd suppose,"_ and as he said that I have no clue what he's referring to. Actually, he sounded a bit distracted now that I think about it.

"Is everything alright over there, Detective?" I asked after a moment of silence on his end.

Silence still, and then, _"I just thought of something Watanabi said. I need to double check it, but come over later and we'll see if it pans out."_

And then he hung-up without so much as a goodbye.

I looked at my cellphone with a look of disbelief. "Well!" I said with a huff. "No rest for the wicked, I guess..."

**The Trip over to Shinjuurou Yuuki and Rie Kaishou's shared apartment was the usual one, dragged down only by the weary weight of this case...**

"Wow, this place looks tossed," I remarked upon entering the house.

"That'll happen when a Toaster Cat absconds with a box of chocolates," Surprisingly, it was An Osada who was there to greet me.

"So what's the story?" I asked her.

"Oh, Inga said something stupid, ran off before he could think it over, got lost in the rain," An listed off the list of events since last night, "he stayed the night at my place as I talked him through _all_ of the steps of making up with Kazamori, and even taught him how to make chocolate candies-"

"Yum."

"-And then Kato goes and screws the whole day up by stealing a box of said chocolates, and then proceeded to eat it all, forcing us to spend the whole day at the Vet while they pumped his systems to clear it out."

"Ew."

"Exactly," and with that, An lead me into the main room where Shinjuurou and Rie were talking over a laptop.

"Speaking of, where're Inga and Kazamori?" I asked.

"Oh, they went out to meet the Dinner Reservations I placed last night- thankfully this was all over with before then so they could have that..." An sighed. "It would've been a waste of planning otherwise."

"So what exactly brought all this on?" I asked, "Inga saying something stupid?"

"Inga quoting one of Yuuko's newly made memories," Shinjuurou and Rie said at the exact same time.

Aw, how cute!

I laughed, "You guys are adorable!"

Rie just motioned me over, saying to Shinjuurou, "Yeah, I think that's what we're looking for."

"So what's the scoop?" I sat down next to them to look at the screen, a transcript of Watanabi's questioning, before her memory got wiped.

"Watanabi said something the other day about Atsuhiko being a sort of..." He then moused to highlight a certain section of text, and read it, "'A perverted Influence of having fun', that some of the others in the Student Council might not take so kindly to Hinata's dating."

"You're thinking Yuuko's hiding in the student council?" I asked.

"The thing is she then said," Rie moved to highlight a different section of text to read. "'The only one who wouldn't throw a fuss would be Dog-girl.' Inga asked who for clarification, and she replied, 'Yusa-Chan.'"

"Wait, isn't that the girl who Yuuko was trying to talk to when you ran into her?" I asked.

"Aoi Yusa," Shinjuurou said with a nod. "I think she'll be worth talking to tomorrow."

"So...Yuuko's basically chowing down on all the perverts of the school?" I had to ask.

"Or at least everyone related to the Student Council in some way," Rie agreed.

"Okay, that'd make sense...if we didn't already have three bodies fished up from the harbor," I frowned. "They're definitely not students of the school. Besides Atsuhiko, there haven't been any reported deaths or disappearances."

"Parents then?" Shinjuurou offered.

"You think some kids would have lost their parents and not said anything?" I asked, somewhat in disbelief.

"You'd be surprised how little you care about someone who doesn't want to act like a parent," An said, scowling as she thought of her mother, no doubt.

"I'm thinking-" Shinjuurou said- "that the main key here is that Yuuko is targeting people who are being bad influences and doing it ironically at the same time. Atsuhiko was sexing up Hinata, so Yuuko killed him for that, using his own sex drive as the key to getting in to eat his soul."

"Yusa wouldn't bat an eye to Hinata and Atsuhiko, so that's why Yuuko was trying to go after her... Maybe to see what made her tick before trying to go in for the kill?" Rie continued. "But Shinjuurou and Inga stopped that, and that made her skip ahead to the next target."

"Watanabi," I said, "but she didn't have the time to kill her, so instead she just took the girl's memories and ran."

"Right," Shinjuurou nodded- "And that lead back to Matsuda, Atsuhiko's parental figure, and..."

"The one who was keeping Atsuhiko out of trouble with the school by taking him out clubbing," Rie finished that sentence.

It couldn't be helped, An and I both 'daww'ed over their sentence finishing.

They didn't seem to notice.

"So then if 'corrupting influence' can refer to the parents and not the kids themselves..." Rie continued to wonder.

"Maybe the students whose parents are missing have been used to their parents vanishing for long periods of time?" Shinjuurou asked.

"Or they could have mob ties," Rie continued, "which would explain the harbor dumping and hand removals."

"But why cut out the organs and chop off the hands?" I had to ask. "That sounds more like they're trying to hide the identity of the bodies, or obscure the cause of death."

"Maybe it's an irony thing- they were butchers?" Shinjuurou asked.

"Or maybe they worked at the morgue?" Rie suggested. "Organs get removed like that all the time, don't they?"

"Hold on," I spoke up. "Max said that Jane Doe was cut open with a sword. That doesn't fit at all."

They went silent.

"A sword?" An asked, surprised. "What kind of sword?"

"I dunno..." I shrugged, "Max said they were sword wounds. I could call and ask if he's figured out what kind, but...I doubt it after the amount of decay. I'd guess a Katana or something- it'd leave pretty distinctive marks."

"Yuuko had access to a sword?" Shinjuurou frowned- "Why would she use a sword?"

"The wounds were sewn shut too," I added, "after the organs got removed."

"Why would she go to all that trouble?" Rie asked.

"Maybe the first few kills weren't Yuuko who did it," Shinjuurou seemed to have had a realization. "What if it's whoever Yuuko's possessing who accidentally killed then, and woke Yuuko up?"

**"That raises the question then," I said, "who's she possessing?"**

The remainder of the week would go by without any major break in the case as we held questionings at the school of every single student and teacher, regardless of if they'd had any ties to the case or not.

Strangely, the girl we wished to talk to the most, Student Council Treasurer Aoi Yusa, didn't come into class at all. As for her father... He hadn't seen her since the morning of Inga and Shinjuurou confronting Yuuko in the hallways.

What a load of bull!


	7. There'll be Peace when you are Done

**CHAPTER 6: "There'll be Peace when you are Done."**

It was Wednesday, and club activities were allowed to resume once more despite previous announcements, which was a welcome break to the absolute chaos that had been the whole week leading up to it.

The Neighbors Club- MY club- was open once more, and our first topic of the day was a simple one.

"The Police obviously think that someone at this school is a mass murderer," I declared soundly.

"No way, Yozora!" The Cow said. "There's no way that could happen! I mean, there's only been what- One actual murdered student here? Some girl got amnesia and that's it."

"Haven't you been paying attention to the news?" I asked- "Bodies were pulled up from the harbor! Multiple bodies! We're dealing with a Serial Killer among us!"

Kobato and Maria both whined in fear at my shouting- and good! They should be afraid!

"Look, Yozora," Kodaka spoke up. "I doubt there's actually someone who's going around killing people at this school."

"So you're on the Cow's side then?" I asked.

"What-?" He seemed to falter.

"They're interrogating students one classroom at a time!" I said, "There's no other reason for that than to see if everyone's identity's check out! I've heard some students have had the Police come and check their homes already!"

"Rika will admit that it does sound fishy!" Rika said, "Pardon the pun. But, um...Rika wonders why the everyone seems to think its someone at this school? They have a sketch of the suspect, don't they?"

"From what I've been able to gather, they think this Serial Killer has a type!" I said. "They're looking for someone who goes and roots out perverted thinkers!"

Another frightened squeak from the two girls. Hmf, there's something weird about that, but I just can't place my fingers on it... Regardless, I continued.

"And also, they think this killer is a mass hypnotist! Able to manipulate the minds of everyone around us into thinking that she's one of us!" I wanted to say more, but...

"This last month has just been one cascade of misfortune," Yukimura said so quietly that somehow we all managed to hear it.

Immediately, I felt like a jerk for going on about a killer with her in the room. What was I thinking? I should have been more considerate to that fact, shouldn't I? She'd just tried within the last week to-

So I said: "That's why it's so annoying! That these Cops are just coming in and trying to find someone pretending to be a student just after someone tried to...To..." And I stumbled over my words so badly that even the Cow gave me a sympathetic look. I settled for crossing my arms and turning to face a window- "I just wish that everything would go back to normal already!"

What was normal, even? Trying to figure out ... something... Something...

Something felt weird.

Everything was just so out of whack after Yukimura had tried to jump... Our whole inter-group relationships were changed so drastically...

We were all well on our way to maybe, just possibly, becoming friends on our own, when...

When suddenly Kodaka and Rika are working to keep Yukimura stable, when suddenly the Nun and the Vampire don't argue, when...When even the Cow seems to be out of place with events.

**And then there was a knock at the door.**

Much to my surprise, it was Yusa who was knocking at the Neighbor's club door.

Much to my confusion, she wasn't wearing her school uniform. Hadn't I heard something about her catching a cold? Funny, she didn't look sick at all... though, those clothes did look somewhat dirty and wrinkled. Had she been sleeping in them or something?

"Erm...Uh..." She was touching her index fingers together nervously, "May I please come in?"

For a moment, I wasn't sure what to say.

There was something off about all of this.

None of the others knew had happened in the hallway that day, not even Kobato...I turned to look at Rika, who just gave a shrug.

So I turned back to Yusa and said, "Sure, come on in."

**Yukimura placed a cup of tea on the table in front of where Yusa, Aoi, was sitting.**

Kodaka was sitting across from her, slightly confused and embarrassed.

Rika was eying the girl carefully...

Yozora...was looking at Kodaka? What was going through that girl's mind, I wonder...?

Kobato-chan and Maria were sitting on the couch...aww, were they holding hands? I tried to sit up just a bit to see for sure, but then Yukimura stood between me and them and I couldn't see. No fair, Yukimuraaaa!

"So," Kodaka began, talking towards Yusa, who, apparently, was a girl from my class. I'd heard that someone had gotten a cold, and had been absent... But this was her? She didn't look sick, just...Tired?

"I-" Yusa spoke up, then stopped for a second before repeating: "I want to apologize for my behavior the other day!" And then she bowed her head forwards, her small height leading to her nearly hitting her head against the table. "I don't know what came over me to say it...but everything I said was what I truly feel..."

I raised an eyebrow, looking at Kodaka, "What's this...?" I tried to ask, but then...

"I take it there's a reason you were even thinking about what you said?" He said before I could even start talking.

"I...I've always liked people like you to begin with. I love stories about them too..." Yusa glanced around the room at all of us with her red eyes...funny, she almost looks like a lost little puppy dog. "But..." she seemed to finally admit something even to herself, "my mother left us recently, when the Rising Sun Hack happened. And my father...he..." I had no idea what any of this was referring to, but the Rising Sun...

Those people who had taken over the internet and the TV and all to take down a corrupt politician...

Or something like that... I'd never paid much attention to the news.

"My mother turned out to be a supporter of theirs," Yusa said, "she worked at the TV station, and helped set that final broadcast up. My father took it hard...and, he started to take his aggressions out on me because I look like her."

Wait- what?

A glance around the room, everyone seemed surprised by this...I... "I don't know what even to say to something like that." Oh, damn, did I just do that thing Kodaka always does?

"Verbally!" Yusa then said- "Verbally, I mean! He hasn't... He wouldn't...! He goes out at night for that!"

"Rika isn't sure verbally isn't the worse of the two she was thinking of," Rika said silently, though I think she was sighing a bit in relief on the inside like we all were.

"So," Kodaka frowned, "you wanted me to..ah...ask you out..." Why did that sound like he was substituting words? Why did Yusa seem relieved when he said it like that? "Because...?"

"Because he...he said I'd never be able to find a husband because of what my mother did. And...and when he found out I'd said what I did, he..." She sniffed. "He kicked me out of the house. Sometimes I wish he'd just choke on his words for being such a dick!"

And there was the whole thing.

"Ah," Kodaka said, glancing at Rika. They nodded, then he looked at Yozora...

"Do I even need to say it?" She asked him, then turned to search one of the desks, "I'll go find the paperwork..."

"Huh?" Yusa seemed confused. "What...?"

"If you want a place to hang out at to avoid that stuff," Kodaka said, "you're always welcome to come here during the day."

"And!" Rika spoke up- "If you need a place to spend the night, just ask any one of us!"

Wait- what are you volunteering me for!?

I got a slap in the face with the fly-swatter for that.

"I said that aloud, didn't I?" I grumbled.

"Yeah, you did," Yozora said, smirking slightly as she twirled the flyswatter around.

"Y-You really want to be that kind to me?" Yusa asked Kodaka.

"Like I said before," he said, "I'm not that kind of person."

And then she started to cry- "Thank you!"

**Then there was another knock at the door.**

"Rika will get it!" I said, moving over to the door, and opening it with a crack to peer through it.

"Hi there," The Police Chief waved, "I'm Katawase, Mayoi, Police Chief." She motioned to the tall man next to her, "This is Detective Yuki, Shinjuurou, and his assistant," she motioned to the young boy grinning up at me, "Inga." She flashed her badge just to be sure- "We thought we just saw one Yusa, Aoi, heading into this club room, is she here?"

I frowned- "What's this about, officers?"

"We just want to ask her a few questions," The Detective said. "We've been wanting to get in contact with her for the last few days, but she's been absent from school."

I made sure to stand in the doorway as I opened it a bit more to block their view into the room- "Why do you want to talk with her? If she was here, I mean."

"We're concerned that she may be the next target of a serial killer," the Assistant said rather happily, "we just want to see if she recognizes a sketch is all!"

It couldn't be helped, they heard Yusa yelp from inside in surprise.

With a sigh, I said, "Rika will let you in now!"

And I let them step into the Club Room.

They re-introduced themselves to Yusa, and then showed a printed out sketch of the suspect.

"Do you recognize this woman?"

All at once, there was a sense of...

Of...

I'm not sure what it was.

But...most of us seemed to recognize the sketch.

"Yeah..." Yusa said, frowning. "I recognize her, but... I don't know from where...?"

"I recognize her too," Kodaka said, "but I don't know from where either."

"The news maybe?" Yozora frowned.

"Rika vaguely knows her too..." I said.

"Nope!" Maria shook her head- "Don't know her!"

"I don't know her either," Kobato agreed.

"I've not seen her before," Yukimura said.

And then...

"I saw her once heading down the hallway outside," Sena said.

"You did?" The Detective asked. "When and where?"

"It was earlier today, when I was coming to the clubroom," Sena said. "She was just going around a corner, and I thought it odd that I didn't see her after I went around the same corner. I thought she might have been someone there to visit another club room."

"So she might still be here," The Assistant breathed.

"That's really cocky of her," The Chief said.

"Helps the theory though," The Detective said, and motioned for the Assistant to go outside, possibly to check the other club rooms.

"What theory?" I asked.

They seemed to speak as if they'd rehearsed it...or just happened to say it so many times before that it was muscle memory by now.

"The woman in this picture, who we've tentatively ID'd as "Yuuko", is a master hypnotist. She's able to make people see her as someone else," The Chief said. "She's the prime suspect in a series of murders going back across the last week."

"We think she's stalking around this school to find her targets, people with perverted streaks in them," The Detective said. "It's not always the students she's after, though, the latest victim was the guardian of Atsuhiko, Hirokazu."

"How terrible," Yozora said.

"Is that why we all sort of vaguely recognize her?" Kodaka asked. "She's hypnotized us to forget her face?"

"You and Yusa actually had a direct encounter with her the other day," The Detective said.

"What?" seemed to be the room's general consensus.

"I don't remember..." Yusa said.

"That," Kodaka even finished, almost in a daze.

"She was using a hypnotizing technique on you two when Inga and I stumbled upon the scene," The Detective continued on. "We interrupted the process, and she ran. We chased after but lost her trail after she made a student by the main gates forget her memories."

"That's why you're concerned Yusa might be a target," Sena breathed out.

"Exactly," The Chief said. "With your sudden absence, we were worried that you might have already been attacked, but now that we know you're safe, we'd appreciate it if you stay that way."

The assistant peeked back into the room and said, "She's not here."

**"Thank you for your time," and with that, we left the club room.**

"Was that really wise to tell them about Yuuko?" Katawase asked.

"Probably not," I said. "But I have the feeling they'll be safer in numbers, and be keeping an eye out for Yuuko if something were to happen."

"It's a good idea, and Yuuko'll probably leave them alone now, too," Inga said. "Everything in that room was dripping with her energy...Even this hallway...The other rooms too. She's covered her scent all over the place so much that it's impossible to tell what's the most recent."

"So she's covering her tracks," Katawase said. "Yuuko's probably stalking one or more of them."

"Basically," Inga agreed.

And so we waited to see what would happen next.

_**_'Call me, Beep me, if you wanna reach me!'_**_

The Jukebox was playing some old theme song from the early 2000's, at the request of some jubilant Twenty Year old from America seeking to relive some childhood memories in the middle of a drinking bar.

It was a completely nonsensical thing for a Jukebox to have on it, but given the transformation wave that had hit everything, that the Jukebox itself had developed its own tastes wasn't that surprising.

The man at the bar grumbled and downed another drink.

"Yusa, Cronus-san?" A soft voice asked from behind him.

"Nyeh?" He glanced over his right shoulder as a woman sat down next to him. "What'd'ya want?"

"I hear you're the kind of man who knows how to get down," the woman, of course, was none-other-than Yuuko. Who else would it have been. "And I...am looking to get down," She winked at him seductively.

"Nyeh, go find someone else to bother," He took a swing of what had been refilled into his glass. "It's Thrusday, so tonight I'm busy drownin' myself in beer."

"Oh, well that's just a shame," Yuuko said with a tired sigh- "I've had my eye on you all night you see, and I've only just built up my courage to come talk with you."

"Really now?" There was a devilish smirk. "Well wha'd'ya say to having a few drinks with me, and we'll...ehe...get to know eachother better."

"That sounds wonderful..." Yuuko smiled.

**Only God knows how many drinks later, and they were at his house- drunken and stumbling down the halls.**

Giggles were had, and loud moans and growls occurred as their clothes went all over...

And then they hit the bed and...

_Shink_

"Sorry, Cronus, but you're just not my type after all," Yuuko sneered at him, and then with a mighty slash-!

Blood hit the ceiling, and Cronus Yusa roared in pain.

**It wasn't the sudden yelling that woke up the neighbors, no, that was to be expected of the man who lived in that house.**

No.

What woke the neighbors up was the sudden _**BANG**_ and a _**POP**_ along with a brilliant, violet flash of light from every window of that house that lasted for a good minute before fading.

When a concerned neighbor found the front door left open, they expected many, many, horrible things...

What they found was a million times worse.

**Cameras Flashed.**

Shinjuurou Yuuki, the once Defeated Detective, had a sense of Dejavu as he entered the bedroom.

"Welcome to Casa de Murder...Uh...Seven. I think," Katawase grumbled. "It's way too late for this shit."

The bedroom was coated ceiling to floor and everything in between with blood.

The bed held the remains of a single man, whose head was now lying on the floor, covered up with a cloth.

"So...uh..." I said, staring up at the walls in fascinated horror. "What happened?"

"First glance?" Katawase grumbled- "Guy got his head blown off at the neck from the inside out."

"O...kay?" Shinjuurou looked at the body that was presently being photographed by the Coroner on duty. It definitely looked like the neck had literally exploded. "What with?"

"Ain't got a clue what made him go _boom_," Katawase grumbled, "and quite frankly, my dear detective, I don't give a damn until I've got three gallons of coffee down the hatch and a ten ton bottle of brain bleach to get the sight out of my eyes."

It certainly was gruesome, especially the...ah...nether regions.

"So what happened there?" I had to ask.

"Guy got his dick cut off and shoved down his throat along with whatever made it go boom, the remains of it are still stuck in his mouth, which is how we know that...urgh," Katawase said without care, rubbing at her forehead. "It's Too Fucking early for this."

"That's certainly..." Shinjuurou struggled for the words. "...Odd."

"And you're sure it's Yuuko's work?" I asked, even though I knew what she'd probably say.

"Neighbors saw a blinding flash of pink light through every single window," Katawase said. "Also, check out the blood splatter fringes."

Shinjuurou and I did just that, and we both blinked in confusion.

"Is that a butterfly?" Shinjuurou finally asked.

Every fragment of blood had landed in the distinct pattern of butterflies, almost as if someone had decided to take a spray brush on a computer program, set it to a Butterfly Stencil, and then coat the walls in a blood red coloring.

"Damn it...It's definitely Yuuko, alright," I grumbled.

**"Vic's name is Cronus Yusa," I said as we stepped into a coffee shop for a much needed break. "And I don't think I need to tell you what this means."**

"After what we heard them talking about when we walked up to that door," Inga said, "Yuuko could've been anywhere in that hallway and heard it just like we did."

"She could have even been inside that room, and just transformed too," Shinjuurou added onto that.

"It's way too early for this..." I peered out at the small line at the counter, then glanced at my watch. 1:13 A.M. "Buncha f'kin' night owls..." I moved to join the line. "You comin'?"

After ordering our coffee, receiving it, and finding a table to sit at, we resumed the conversation I was trying to ignore.

"The one thing we know for sure though," Shinjuurou said, "is that Yuuko wasn't after his soul."

"All that blood on the wall was laced with it," Inga added quietly. "The pink flash of light they all saw was the soul exploding out through his neck with nowhere else to go."

"So this was a revenge killing plain and simple,"I took a sip of my coffee- Ow! Hot...! _**Hot!**_ "Okay," I forced the grimace away, "so... What's our next move?"

"Informing next of kin, obviously," Shinjuurou said. "If Yuuko is watching those kids closely enough for most of them to recognize the sketch, when the rest of the school population we've asked has said they don't recognize her at all...Then that means she's got something in mind for them."

"You thinking Yuuko's possessing one of them?" I took another, this time more cautious sip of coffee. Ahh, Much better...!

I think I burnt my tongue though...

"That, or she's hiding out in one of the nearby rooms..." Inga grumbled. "That whole hallway smelled like her. The clubroom too."

"We'll have to do some investigating tomorrow during classes," Shinjuurou said, "then ask this..." he reached into his pocket to pull out a flyer he'd found on a poster board, "'Neighbors Club'," he read the name, "more than a few questions."

"I did some digging earlier after our little encounter earlier," I started to recall the information I'd looked up. "Turns out that the older blond chick was Kashiwazaki, Sena, daughter of Kashiwazaki, Pegasus, the headmaster of the school. Yusa-chan's her classmate."

"Odd coincidence," Inga noted, then took a sip out of his own coffee.

"Not really," I said, "the girl in the maid costume? Kusunoki, Yukimura. I think she's the student who tried jumping off of the bell tower."

"They're in the same club," Shinjuurou said, "that makes sense why the Chairman Headmaster guy would go to such lengths to keep it quiet."

"I think that's our trigger event, this girl leaping off of the tower." I brought up my cellphone and scrolled to a picture of the broken gate, "Here, look at this." I held it out for Inga and Shinjuurou to see.

"Wow, that's totally busted!" Inga grinned slightly, then frowned. "Wait a second. What is that?"

"It _was_ the gate keeping students from doing just what Kusunoki did. Climbing up to jump off," I pocketed my phone after they'd gotten a good look. "Apparently, Hasegawa, Kodaka- pudding haired guy- and Shiguma, Rika- the brown haired girl with glasses who, by the way, is _also_ one of THE scientific minds of her generation. She doesn't even have to go to the school, and only does such because Kashiwazaki Senior had her brought in-" I paused to take another swig of coffee, I was starting to ramble- "Well, right, apparently those two FOUND the gate that way when they went to rescue Kusunoki."

Shinjuurou mused... And then snapped his fingers. "Inga- remember the case with the _other_ Rising Sun?"

"Haah?" Inga blinked.

"Where the gold was inside the Tank," Shinjuurou reminded him.

"Oh yeah! I totally tore that thing open like it was tissue..." Inga's enthusiasm fell flat in that moment. "Paper."

"So either Kusunoki's Yuuko's host, or Yuuko was trying to kill Kusunoki by breaking down the gate for her and letting her climb up on her own," Shinjuurou said.

"Kusunoki's also one of the only three club members that didn't recognize the sketch," I added. "The other two, Takayama, Maria, and Hasegawa, Kobato, aren't likely suspects, though."

"Why's that?" Shinjuurou asked.

"Too young," I said. "Plus, did you see how they were dressed? A Nun and a Vampire? Obviously cosplaying. Yuuko's got no real reason to hang around in one of them."

"That's assuming that Yuuko's _not_ keeping her host in the dark," Inga spoke up. "When I...ah...met Shinjuurou for the first time," He struggled with the words for a moment, "I kept him aware of everything that was going on. But I just as easily could have made him unaware of what was going on."

"What about the others and their backgrounds?" Shinjuurou asked.

"Mikazuki, Yozora, she's the one who did the club's paperwork, also done incorrectly I might add, since she lists Takayama, Maria as the Teacher." I chuckled, "That kid's just the sister of a Sister who teaches at the school...But I don't think she actually doesn't know she's not a real teacher. I interviewed her sister, Takayama, Kate. Apparently she just thinks the Nun costume is cute and thinks the paperwork she has Maria do will build character..." I shook my head, then took a large gulp of coffee. Ahh, much better now that it's cooled off some! "Anyways, Mikazuki lists Hasegawa, Kodaka, as a co-founder. His younger sister is the vampire we saw in there. Mikazuki's generally a 'cold' person, from what I was able to gather up, but Hasegawa, Kodaka, has a much larger rap sheet in terms of the rumors circulating about him...curiously, a lot of those stopped after he saved Kusunoki from falling to her doom."

"It all comes back to her, doesn't it?" Shinjuurou mused.

"Seems like it..." Inga cracked a rather creepy grin. "This is going to be fun."

"...Did he always used to be that creepy?" I asked, "Or is it just how early it is and I need more coffee?"

"I blame what little coffee he's had," Shinjuurou remarked, and then casually sipped at his own coffee.

"Anyways," I took another sip of coffee, definitely way too early for this shit, "the Hasegawas are mixed Japanese-British, mother died a few years back, father works overseas...Oh, and get this."

"Let me guess, ties to Kashiwazaki's family?" Shinjuurou asked.

"Got it in one," I nodded, even as Inga went for another sip of coffee himself, then said. "It's ridiculous how tied up all these kids are."

"It's the perfect knot for Yuuko to try untangling..." Inga paused, then added, "or to try her best to keep together while she hides away in it."

"So our suspect pool's been narrowed down to Yuuko stalking them, or possessing Kusunoki..." Shinjuurou mused.

"I'm planning on taking a trip to her house tomorrow morning," I then corrected herself, "Sorry, this morning. Once I get some sleep, I mean. Maybe I'll catch her parents and be able to ask if there have been any changes in behavior...Beyond the Suicide thing, I mean."

"We'll run some tests on the walls during classes," Shinjuurou said, "see if Yuuko was hiding in any of the other rooms and we missed her."

Inga took another sip of coffee.

"You're going to have to break the news to Yusa that her dad's dead," I pointed a finger at him causally while holding my coffee cup with the same hand. I think I'm finally starting to feel the caffeine starting to work.

"I'll leave that to Rie," Shinjuurou said, then taking another sip of his coffee. "If Yuuko's targeting this club now, I want her as far away from it as possible."

"She's not going to like that," I warned.

"Tell me about it," Shinjuurou grumbled. "She wasn't too happy that I got called out of bed just after midnight."

"We'll make it up to her by catching Yuuko," Inga said with a lot of determination and a widening grin.

"Yeah alright, that's enough coffee for you," Shinjuurou reached for the cup, but Inga just held it out of arm's length.

"No! It's mine! MINEEEEE! Do you hear me, Shin-Juu-Ro!?" Inga hissed at the Detective- _"MIIIIINEEEEE!"_

"Fine," Shinjuurou said, "but Kazamori's going to hit you over the head if you don't calm down before breakfast."

**Kazamori slapped Inga over the head with the diner menu.**

"Ow!" Inga yelped.

"Told you," Shinjuurou said with a dry chuckle.

"That's for letting me sleep without telling me you were heading out," Kazamori said towards Inga, ignoring Shinjuurou's comment. "I thought for a moment that...that...!"

"I'm sorry," Inga said, bowing his head sharply so fast that it actually hit the table. With a clatter and a "Gah!" Inga flew backwards, hands clutching towards his forehead, and then... BAMPF, he hit his head on the back of the booth. "OWOWOWOW!"

Kazamori, to her credit, only giggled for a split second before reaching over to inspect the damage, "Are you okay?"

"I got hit in the head three times within a minute," Inga grumbled, "what do you think...?"

I just sat there watching for a few moments, and then turned to Shinjuurou and said, crossly, "So you're making me go deliver the bad news to the girl while you and Inga and Kazamori test how well sound travels between walls?"

"Rie, I'd rather not have either you or Kazamori anywhere near Yuuko if she goes off," Shinjuurou said. "Too much risk that she'll attack you."

"And what about you and Inga?" I asked.

"If things go the way I expect they will, she won't hurt us," he said in that 'so sure' way that was always so infuriating. "If things don't, then it's pointless to plan because I have no clue what she'll be doing."

I thought on that for a moment as I chewed on a fork-full of strawberry topped pancake...Then I said after finishing, "Then you'd better make sure things go the way you expect them to."

"Will do," He said.

"And don't die on either of us, alright?"

"I'll try not to."

**"So what are we going to do for dinner?" Inga yelled from the Clubroom.**

From a few rooms down the hallway, I tabbed the radio and said, "Victory Pizza, I believe, and I heard you loud and clear. Shinjuurou-sama?"

Click! _"Didn't hear a thing from down here. Looks like this room's the outer limits of hearing range for that clubroom."_

Click! _"Pizza!? Awesome!"_

I winced at the sound coming through the micro-speaker as Inga's voice carried through the walls well enough without its aid.

Click! "Just... Don't use the radio to say that next time, please? You nearly blew my eardrum out with the feedback."

Click! _"Oh, sorry. I forgot for a moment..."_

I sighed, then clicked in again, "Shinjuurou-sama, how far away are you compared to my present position?"

Click! _"Edge of the building. If this is his yelling range, then we've got a good baseline to try to figure out the normal talking distance. Inga, feel free to monologue...Room level, though."_

Click! _"Yokai!"_

And then silence.

That means I'm far enough out to not hear room level voices. Time to begin walking closer.

After two months of having time to adjust to having an organic body rather than a robotic one, I have to say I've come to the conclusion that being a Robot was at least more useful, technologically speaking, for tasks like these.

Add in the hormonal imbalances... and emotional responses.

I've wondered on certain occasions why and how humans put up with their own daily lives...

And then I could hear Inga talking, I stopped walking.

"...just want this Yuuko thing to be over with so I can put it all behind me once and for all." He was saying. "No more powers...no more cases... Just...just figuring things out. That's all I want. A chance for us to figure things out and be able to just... _work_!" He sounded so exasperated at himself. "I feel like I'm a gear just not meshing...I'm missing pieces and...I just want to be able to figure out how to turn properly...if that even makes any sense... Damn it mind! Come up with metaphors that actually make sense! Gears...really? What am I even thinking here!?"

Click! "I happen to think gears are an appropriate metaphor for our situation," I said.

The sound of Inga fumbling over his words was rather satisfying.

I then added onto the radio- "By the way, I'm able to hear you now. Shinjuurou-sama?"

Click! _"Nothing yet. Still walking. Keep talking."_

Click! "Understood," I said, and then made note of where I was at. At least two rooms away from the club room.

"So, ah...how much of that did you hear?" Inga asked.

Click! "Everything from 'Just want this' to 'what am I thinking'," I said.

"So pretty much half of that then..."

Click! "I'm going to start searching the other rooms now."

"Oh, alright."

Click! "Feel free to keep talking."

"Right! Sure thing!"

I went into one of the club rooms, and started walking around as I listened.

"So ah...Is it too early to start thinking about names?" He sounded rather distant at middle of this room.

Click! "No, considering the trouble we had naming Kato."

"Right so..." and by the corners, rather un-hearable at all. Back towards the door... "... we could name him _Spike_, and if it's a girl, we could go with-"

Click! "Don't say _Twilight, Sparkle_, or _Buffy_, Please."

"I was actually thinking maybe Angie?"

Click! "Angie? Really?" I stepped out of the room and moved for one of the other rooms.

"Well, they can't all be winners, but..."

Click! "I actually like it. Angie sounds good for a girl's name, even if it does follow that same Vampire theme I accidentally set up there."

"R-Really?" Again- middle of the room, low-quality sounds...

Click! "If it's a boy though, I was thinking Souji."

"I really like that name!" Bizarrely- the further corners of the room were louder despite being further away.

"Strange..." I frowned.

"Huh?" Inga asked.

"There's an odd pocket of space here that has sounds being louder," I frowned. "I'm not even using the Radio right now."

"Ehh!?" And then he realized- "Hey! You're right!"

Click! "Shinjuurou-sama, I've found a spot in one of the club rooms that amplifies the sound somehow..." I looked upwards, and then described what I'd spotted, "An air vent, Iit looks like. Inga, see if there's anything in that room like that."

Click! _"Got it!"_

Click! _"Good find, Kazamori. That's one notch towards Yuuko spying on them from somewhere else."_

Click! "Thank you, but I'm not certain that this room is being used by Yuuko for spying."

Click! _"Found a vent! It's hidden under the table..."_

Click! "Thank you, Inga." I narrowed my eyes up at the ceiling vent. Now how exactly did the vents work out like that?

Up and then...down? Was there a maze system or something?

That shouldn't work at all.

There's something weird about this school.

**"My...dad...?"**

I so did not want to be doing this right now.

"How...did he die?" Aoi Yusa asked.

So. SO do not want.

"Well..." If what Shinjuurou said was true, then... Damn it, how do I make this child friendly? Sigh, guess there's no way around it. "Someone cut off his junk and used it to push something down his throat that...well...made his neck explode."

She just blinked at me, and then, sort of made this wet whining sound from the back of her throat. "Oh My God!" and then there came the waterworks... bound to happen given... "I DIDN'T DO IT!"

"W-_**What**_?"

"I was just blowing off steam when I said I wanted him to choke on his words, and-and- I called him a dick too!" Aoi was crying now. "I really didn't want someone to actually cut it off and choke him on it...!"

_What._

**KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK.**

Silence.

I frowned.

The Kusunoki residence was as silent as a mouse. Neighbors never even noticed it, since apparently the house was always usually quiet. The only sign of abandonment was the massive stack of mail growing in the Mailbox, and a small pile of newspapers by the front door.

Apparently, the night before Kusunoki, Yukimura jumped, she had a fight with her parents, which had been the only sign of activity the neighbors remembered due to it's unusualness...

"What's that?" I asked aloud despite nobody being there. "Is someone asking for help?"

And with that- I kicked the front door open and stormed inside.

"POLICE! IS ANYONE HOME!?"

Silence again.

I quickly began searching the rooms, one by one by one by-

Wait- was that a sword?

I stopped in the dining room and looked up at the Ancestral Katana laying on display on the mantle in its sheath.

Carefully, I pulled on latex gloves and went over to pick up the weapon...

"Please don't be covered in blood, please don't be covered in blood..." And I slid it open.

**Shit.**

The "Defeated Detective", Inga, Kazamori, and Rie were discussing something with a concerned Aoi Yusa when the Neighbors Club arrived to make use of their clubroom.

"What's going on here?" Yozora asked.

"We're just finishing up with Yusa-chan, actually," Rie then said to the red-head. "Let's head over to the Nurses office, alright?"

"Ok," Yusa nodded, and then the two of them left.

Shinjuurou then said, "Kazamori, you take the kids into other room. They don't need to hear this."

"Understood," and with that, Kazamori turned to Kobato and Maria, "could you two please come with me?"

"What's going on that you're splitting us up like this?" Kodaka asked.

"We're conducting a murder investigation," Inga said.

"Yusa, Aoi's father was murdered last night," Shinjuurou said once Kazamori had lead Kobato and Maria out of the room and closed the door behind her. "Specifically, his dick was cut off and shoved down his throat along with an organic explosive device."

Yozora's face went pale, and Sena looked as if she wanted to throw up. Kodaka got a disgusted look on his face, and Rika...

"Organic explosive!?" She was actually somewhat hyper about that. "What kind of explosive is it!? What happened?! Rika's never heard of such a thing!"

"We're not at liberty to discuss that," Shinjuurou said. "We're just wanting to ask you all a few questions."

"What about Kobato-chan and Maria?" Sena asked.

"They're not suspects," Inga said.

**"Wha'd'ya mean I'm not a teacher!?" Maria yelled in surprise.**

"I mean exactly what I said," I said to the girl. "Your older sister just pawns her work off on you."

And then Kobato began to ask, "Then...Is she a Nun?"

"What?" I asked. "No. Maria Takayama not even officially registered as a Nun in the school records. In fact, it's for that reason that I just felt like I should inform you of your current status as being incorrectly set as the Club's adviser in the event that it becomes an issue-"

"I'M NOT A TEACHER!" Maria cheered- and then the two girls threw themselves at each other into a massive hug, which only confused me more as Kobato cheered:

"And I'm not going to hell for fucking a nun! YEAH!"

"Wait...What?" I knit my eyebrows in confusion. "I feel like I'm missing something here."

"We broke a whole lot less rules than we thought we did!" they cheered as one.

Needless to say, I was completely confused by this turn of events.

**"I don't got a clue what that racket was about just now," Shinjuurou said, "but I think they went into the clubroom with the vent."**

"Ignoring that, though," Inga continued on. "We have reason to believe that Yuuko's been spying on you all, atleast during the last few days."

"Why's that?" Kodaka asked.

"Because, as you may or may not recall," Shinjuurou said, "Aoi Yusa said yesterday that she wished sometimes that her father would 'choke on his own dick', to paraphrase loosely, and that's exactly what happened."

"Yuuko's attacks all have a twinge of irony about them," Inga said. "She's like a trickter in that sense. Always giving people their just deserts in a way that's a befitting humiliation to them."

"So what?" Yozora asked. "You think its one of us, don't you?"

And then a cellphone rang.

Shinjuurou answered with a "hello" and stood there silently for a moment. And then I watched as he hung up with a "We're here right now, Thanks," and said, "No, Mikazuki-san, we know who Yuuko's been pretending to be, and we're about to make an arrest, even as I speak."

Inga frowned- "So what, this whole show was for nothing then?"

"Not for nothing," and then Shinjuurou turned towards me and asked, "Yukimura Kusunoki, your suicide attempt wasn't just because your parents were upset with you, was it?"

"What kind of a question is that!?" Kodaka nearly shouted.

Rika put her hands on my shoulders, and said, "It's alright, you don't have to answer that..."

And then I said- **"You can stop now."**

And they did.

The four Neighbors Club members all froze in place, because I had commanded it.

I shrugged out of Rika's grip, and took a few steps forwards to the front of the group.

**"You can remember now,"** I said.

And then they all remembered what I had made them forget.

Sena was the only one who didn't react to the sudden onslaught of memories- hers being the least meddled with. And so she stood on her feet while the others all fell to their knees. "What...Yukimura...?"

I just turned towards Inga and Shinjuurou and asked them, "When did you figure it out?"

"We didn't," Shinjuurou said, "not until Katawase called to let us know that you forgot to clean the blood off of the family Katana that was hanging on your wall in the dining room."

"Damn," I laughed faintly, "it's always something that catches the criminal up in the end, isn't it? Always one tiny little detail..."

"Why are you possessing Kusunoki, Yuuko?" Inga asked.

"Possessing?" I asked- "I'm not possessing at all. Yukimura had a broken soul...I had a broken soul. When I was released from you, I floated, and my soul found its mate in Yukimura. I made her whole...and then she made use of my powers to uncover the truth from her parents."

With a rumble, and a shift of energy, I transformed from the little girls form into that of the older woman, Yuuko, even though it was different from what it had been when I was _Inga_.

Yes, take a step back, _Shinjuurou._ Eyes go wide in fear, _**Inga**__._

"I was content to slumber beneath the surface, filling in the _gaps._" I sneered, "And then her parents shattered what remained of her personality when they told the truth." I then quoted Yukimura's mother, down to the inflection. _"Because I wanted a son to carry on my family legacy. Not a daughter whose only purpose is to bear children."_ And then I quoted Yukimura's father, down to his gruff voice, _"Because I could give her no heir of my own, so I let her sleep with the Chef."_

I sneered, "They thought she would never raise a hand against them. How wrong they were when, as their souls started to leave their body, I took that blade off of the wall and cut them open. And then I hunted down that chef who still worked for the family and I _**sliced**_ him into pieces before I fed them all to the ocean!"

"But she saw, didn't she?" Inga asked. "That girl whose body you're using _**saw**_ what you did. And she hated it." He scowled. "It wasn't the fact that her parents wanted something else from her that drove her to jump off of that tower, it was _**You**_."

"Clever boy, Inga," I narrowed my eyes at him. "Clever boy."

"She broke down the gate at the bell tower using your powers, and then made to jump," Shinjuurou said. "But they caught her. These friends of hers."

"And I'm thankful to them for allowing her the chance to live, but..." I scowled, "Yukimura is a coward. Too ashamed to even see that they care for her, and every time they try to reach through to her, she forces me to take the limelight instead when all I want to do is rest and recover my energy."

"But all of that must have drained you," Shinjuurou continued. "Your powers must have been really weakened from being separated from Inga. And then there's the hypnotism...Managing Bettenou's powers ontop of that must be quite the strain."

"I have to feed to just to stay alive!" I growled- "She doesn't care that I've been doing all of this for her! I saw the look in her parents eyes as they spilled the truth. The small fraction of soul they were giving up wasn't enough to kill them, so they were going to _**Kill**_ Yukimura for finding out...I had to kill them to protect her but she just didn't...! I was so drained from that entire night alone that I needed a full soul to just keep going... It's just my luck that the first person I happened to feed on had to be someone from this school. Maybe if I'd gone for someone else I wouldn't have run into this problem of finding you two."

"I guess we gave you too much credit then," Inga said. "And here I thought you were plotting a whole course of ironic revenge when it turns out that you're just making shit up as you go along."

"I guess you-"

And then Sena tried to tackle me.

Damn- was this whole thing just a distraction to get me Monologging!?

I spun around and grabbed her by the chin as she tried to rush me, and I brought her face up to mine before I spoke, not so much to Sena as to the room itself, "Think long and hard about what you want to do next. Otherwise I'm afraid I'm going to have to do something Yukimura wouldn't like."

**In that brief moment of indecision, she transformed into a burst of Butterflies and escaped.**

Kashiwazaki hit the floor, stunned, and Inga just ran forwards to try to grab another butterfly...

But that was a no go- Yuuko had already escaped.

"Damn it," I grumbled.

So much for sticking to the plan.


	8. Lay your Weary Head to rest

**CHAPTER 7: "Lay your Weary Head to rest."**

We remembered.

"Well," Rika said flatly, "that explains that one day we lost track of her."

"And why Yusa went and said what she said," Kodaka grumbled.

"Yesterday, she told me to ignore the murder investigation," Yozora just stared outwards blankly.

I just frowned- "I had it easy, I guess? She just wanted me to keep daddy from finding out what was going on..."

Then the other detective, Rie Kaishou, came back in then with Yusa.

"So that went about as well as we could have hoped," she said to the first Detective, Yuuki, Shinjuurou. "So now that Yuuko's out in the wind..."

"Literally," the assistant, Inga, remarked.

"What do we do next?" Rie asked.

"Well, best I figure it, we get them somewhere safe and out of the way," Shinjuurou motioned towards all of us, and then added, "I've already called An. She's getting rooms set up at the safe house for them."

"Safe house?" Yusa asked. "What do we need a safe house for?"

"Yuuko...She's not the most stable of people right now," Shinjuurou said. "After blowing her cover like that, we can't risk her coming after any of you."

Well- considering that we'd all just seen Yukimura meddle with our memories, and then transform into this...other woman...

"Alright," I said, "you're the experts on this. I trust you know what you're doing."

Everyone looked at me oddly at that. Oh come on Yozora, don't give me that look...

**Magic.**

Magic was real.

Or at least, as real as it could get.

As we were escorted to an awaiting Limo, with even Kobato and Maria joining us for the trip once more, we were filled in on the details of just what was inside Yukimura by this Kazamori girl.

"Several hundred years ago, Japan sent Kamis out with its warriors for protection, and victory. If they survived, they returned victorious to become Gods," She explained. "Two such Kami, Bettenou and Inga, were lost in battle, and sealed away by the others presence. Both became Demons made up of beliefs, long forgotten. The Kami Inga, was a Demon of Truth. The Kami Bettenou was a Demon of Words. One day, they were resurrected by unknowing travelers. Bettenou gained a body of her own, while Inga required a host. A woman named Yuuko gave her life for that purpose."

We all couldn't help but look to the boy who sat next to her, nervous at the story being told.

"Shinjuurou partnered with Inga for some time, solving cases, finding the hidden Truths of the world...And then Bettenou returned. The two Kami turned Demons battled, with Inga being victorious, devouring Bettenou and preventing her corrupting influence from spreading to the world at large." Kazamori paused, and then said, "And then, through one impetus or another, Inga unintentionally separated himself from his powers, and those powers transformed the world."

"The wave that made machines come to live," I said with a heavy breath. All of those Machine-On-Machine stories once were fiction, now reality...thanks to this boy...? I had to calm myself as she continued on.

"In the end, it seems that whatever remained of Yuuko, as well as fragments of one of the Kami's memories, also escaped in the powers, settling down in Yukimura Kusunoki, creating the situation we're now in." Kazamori concluded. "A story once so long now compressed to but a few paragraphs..."

"Demons, magic...Kamis..." Kodaka shook his head, "it's hard to believe any of this is real."

"Tell me about it," Inga grumbled. "I had to live it."

Kodaka looked to me and asked, "What do you think, Rika?"

What did I think? What did "Rika" think?

"If Rika spilled every perverted thought, it'd come out like Rika wasn't taking this seriously at all!"

Rika said all of that out loud, yup. That I did...

Naturally, I then added after it...

"But in all seriousness, this whole situation is concerning...Yukimura's been possessed by a demon, or a fragment of one, apparently, that doesn't even have its full powers. I just want to see Yukimura back to normal..."

When I saw that there were a few frowns going around at the prospect of not being able to do that, I added...

"But after all this is over with! Rika would like to know more about Demons and Magic and stuff! She's also curious about how Law enforcement deals with them too!"

"I'll talk with Katawase," The Detective Shinjuurou said from the driver's seat. "See if she'll approve it."

**I had the distinct feeling that something was wrong when Shinjuurou had called to set up a safe house again.**

"Twice in three months, this is beginning to become a habit," I grumbled.

That feeling continued to grow and grow as the minutes passed on...And then they pulled up outside, and quickly headed towards the door.

I felt a pit start to form in my stomach as Shinjuurou and the others lead these kids into my house...but it wasn't because of them.

The hair on the back of my neck started to rise, and I looked over my shoulder just in time to see a faint flicker of purple slip through a vent.

"Shinjuu-" I didn't get a chance to warn them.

The moment the front door closed, Yuuko acted.

It seemed like a hurricane of wind filled the room, there was a crashing of glass from somewhere, and then she was suddenly standing there in the middle of the room.

Glaring, angry, snarling.

_**"GIVE! THEM! BACK!" **_Her voice was echoing so loudly that I just stared on as Yuuko...no...was this Yukimura?... stared down Shinjuurou and Inga...

"Just calm down, Yuuko..." Shunjuurou said.

_**"YOU WANT TO TAKE THEM AWAY FROM ME!"**_ The Deity yelled.

"If you're going to act like that, then why shouldn't we run away!?" The dark-haired girl, Yozora, yelled, and immediately regretted it as... whatever was in the center of the room flung a burst of energy at her, knocking her backwards into the blond haired girl, Sena.

_**"SHUT UP!"**_ She yelled, clutching at her head. _**"JUST SHUT UP!"**_

I saw Kazamori trying to move towards the back of the room where I'd left a fire extinguisher after one of Inga's...less successful cooking attempts.

"Hey now!" I yelled- I had to distract Yuuko..Yukimura..whoever was in control now from Kazamri. "That's no way to treat your friends!"

_**"Friends!?"**_ The echo waned just a bit. Maybe... _**"I...I don't **_**HAVE**_** MANY FRIENDS! AND HERE YOU ARE...TRYING TO TAKE THEM FROM ME!"**_

It was a simple phrase in Japanese, "Boku Wa Tomodachi Ga Sukinai."

But in that single phrase, it was definitely Yukimura now that was speaking, her voice rose to levels so high that it felt like my eardrums were going to burst... And there was a loud ringing too...

And then Kazamori flung the fire extinguisher at the back of her head.

The ringing was overwhelmed for a brief moment with a "CLANG."

And then the Demon before us spun around and screeched at Kazamori, _**"YOU'LL DIE FOR THAT!"**_

There was a build up of purple light from her eyes and mouth and then...!

A swarm of butterflies shot out.

"NO!" Someone yelled...or perhaps everyone did...

But in the single second of travel time...

The butterflies failed to reach their intended target.

Inga had thrown himself in between Kazamori and Yuuko...or Yukimura... and...allowed himself to be hit with the butterfly swarm.

But the effect...instead of stopping, it just continued going and going and going... Butterfly after butterfly going into Inga's mouth and eyes...!

And then it did finally stop, and Inga grinned dangerously at the part of him that had been split off.

"Hey, Yuuko!" He said quietly, although giggling slightly "Guess what?"

The woman who had appeared before us took a step back in horror- and she let out a tiny squeak of a "No!"

"You can't steal your own soul!"

Then he shot the butterflies right back at her...

**And the World went White.**

Okay.

So...

That _probably_ wasn't the brightest idea I've ever had.

"Now where am I?" I said aloud as...some mental representation of myself floated in this white void.

It was a mental landscape of some kind, I guess. "SHIN-JUU-ROU!" I called out, "YOU THERE?!"

Silence.

"KAZAMORI!?"

Nothing.

"RIE!?"

Nada.

"An...?"

Zip.

"Yuuko...?"

Zero Degrees!

Alone, I was truly alone...

"Huh?"

Or not.

There, in the distance, was a small, dark purple storm cloud that seemed to be flashing neon violet lightning.

"Well, I guess that's as good of a place as any..."

I started to move over towards it...and then I realized there wasn't any gravity where I was, so...I basically just started flipping end over end without really moving anywhere.

"Woah...! Okay! Note to self: Mental landscapes don't do gravity!"

After I managed to stabilize myself, I figured... "Okay, walking's out, so... Swimming, I guess?"

I... never really learned how to swim, I guess. BUT: enough TV watching had given me a rough idea of what to do...

So I swam through the air towards a storm cloud.

Then I started to swim through Yukimura's memories.

"I swear, if this is what heaven looks like, I'm gonna complain to the guy upstairs!" I then thought about it a bit more. "...If this is what _**hell **_is like,then I'm DEFINITELY taking it up with the guy upstairs... Who's Downstairs."

I don't know how long I was moving, or if I was even making any progress... Time seemed to have no meaning when you were darting from one memory to the next.

But then I saw the memory of that terrible night, and then the whole world faded to black as the storm cloud started getting bigger and bigger and...

Then, I entered the cloud, and suddenly felt the familiar pull of Gravity.

"Aw come on!"

At least it wasn't strong enough to suddenly pull me towards the ground in a split second like in a cartoon... So there's that. I guess.

I descended towards the ground...not that I could see any visible difference, and then walked through the cloud to the eye of the storm.

I pushed through that final barrier of a pressure difference, and then found...

"I'm not really sure what I was expecting," I grumbled.

In the exact center of this whirling storm was a small boy, looking all the world to be a gender flip of Yukimura Kusunoki, being held tighly by a...

Well...

It was Just half of a puzzle, with butterfly shaped pieces, barely held together with...It was an oil slick? I guess?

But as to who 'it' was...

It was Yukimura's female-self, except, not completely, almost like...

Wait, that's exactly what she was.

A shadow.

Yuuko was just a shadow of Yukimura, given form by the rampant energy of my old powers and some of my memories.

(The darkness held within each of us.)

This poor... _Child_.

I think understood now what had happened.

If...Yukimura's mental image was of _himself_, rather than_ herself,_ then the girl...

"Yuuko."

The shadow looked up at me- face half missing as it pulled away from Yukimura's own head- "YOU!" She snarled.

"What are you doing?" I asked.

"What-?"

"Just let him go already. Can't you see that you're hurting him?" I asked.

"HIM!?" She snarled- "THEY FORCED HER TO BE A HIM! SHE IS NOT A HE!"

"Are you absolutely sure about that?" I don't know why I said that, but the words just kept coming. "So what if he was born a girl...isn't it what the soul inside feels that's important? Doesn't Yukimura, despite all that pain, still want to be a boy?"

She just stared at me in confused anger.

I sighed. Of course...I'm not even talking to a full soul here... She wouldn't understand something like that...

A personal desire of someone else conflicting with her own desires.

The Yuuko that I had once possessed taught me that, even if I hadn't realized it until now. This Yuuko...She wasn't that Yuuko.

People clash- souls conflict- And then the stronger will survives.

Even though, in the end, I had ended up with Yuuko's body, she was the one who's will had beaten me.

Rather than be possessed, she had been willing to die.

That Yuuko put me on the path to where I was right now.

Redemption.

The "Yuuko" before me was an echo of who I used to be in that moment.

But echoes don't hold any power unless you let them.

"I Don't know a polite way how to say this, Yuuko, but you're NOT REAL!"

The...Shade- I guess- hissed. "Liar! I AM A PART OF YOU MADE SEPARATE! _**DO NOT DENY ME!**_"

"You're MEMORIES..." Face, meet palm. "MY MEMORIES that got COPIED from me, and then scattered to the wind along with just about everything else I had!"

"AM NOT!"

"Are too!"

"AM NOT!"

"...Am I really doing this right now?"

"AM-!" The Shade moved to pull free...but then didn't. "Grrr...!"

"Just like I thought," I grinned slightly, "you can't attack me, can you?"

She scowled.

The boy whimpered.

"Hey," I called to him, "Yukimura! Are you alright?"

The Shade pulled him in and hissed at me.

"Look, I get that you don't want me here," I said, "but I don't think Yukimura wants you here either..."

More Hissing.

"I've got all day here, hiss all you want. But I'm not leaving til I can talk with him."

"Fffiiiine!" Another hiss, but she went silent, allowing Yukimura to look up.

"Who're you?" He asked.

"I'm Inga, I'm here to rescue you!" I grinned.

"I'm not...I shouldn't..." He frowned- "Am I dead?"

"Not that I'm aware of."

"I...I really should be dead... I think...?" That was a really confused tone. "Didn't I jump off of the tower? I should be dead...Are you trying to rescue me from hell?"

"Nope, just a part of myself that got away from me," I glanced at the Shade, "really, really got away...It's caused you and your friends a whole lot of trouble, so I'm trying to fix that."

"I killed my parents." Yukimura said flatly.

"No, that was her that did that," I pointed at the Shade..."Not you."

"I saw my own hands...I took that sword..."

"That was her, not you! She made you watch..." And she sneered at me in victory.

"You accept me after all!"

"Oh shut up..." I groaned.

"You can't win!" She continued to sneer. "Nothing you say will break him out of this!"

"Yeah, sure, uh-huh," I brushed her off, and continued to focus on Yukimura. "Hey, Yukimura! I knew a girl who got possessed once. She tried to do what you did, and killed herself so that way she wouldn't have to live through being possessed."

"That was YOU!" The Shade yelled.

"Well, I'm not going to let that ever happen again, alright?" I asked for a response, and got a confused blink in return. "I'm going to pull you away from her and then you won't remember her ever touching you because we're going to leave all of that crappy emotional baggage behind _**WITH HER!"**_

"That will never work!" Woah- angry hissing! Are those fangs...? "Now that you've said your plan, I'll make sure I never let go!"

"Well, okay..." I guess I'll have to try something else then. "I'll just going to have to try it then..but, ah...before I do, can I ask you something?"

_**"What?"**_ Wow, that was a sharp pitch of anger.

"Well...you're not really STUCK to Yukimura, are you?" She glared at me. Ah, got it in one. "You're actually stuck in this storm...Or rather, the whole storm IS you, isn't it?" Stronger death glare- wowza! Jackpot! "But there's something anchoring you here, isn't it...or rather, you're trying to anchor something INTO this storm...Am I getting close?"

Wow, I think I'm starting to sound a bit like Shinjuurou here...

"I thought you said you were going to try something bound to failure?" Yuuko asked.

"Yeah, in just a bit," I said, "but before that...Yukimura, did you know your friends saved you from falling to your death because they care about you?"

Let's see if I can do this... I closed my eyes and thought back to the car ride...

There was a flicker, and then Rika appeared standing there...Okay, she was sitting before but if I can just remember her facial movements...

_"But in all seriousness, this whole situation is concerning...Yukimura's been possessed by a demon, or a fragment of one, apparently, that doesn't even have its full powers. I just want to see Yukimura back to normal..."_

I gasped as she flickered out- Okay, That was way too much strain there. No way I'm doing that again...

But I think it got the point through... Yukimura was looking up in surprise, eyes widening, good, great...!

Yuuko's snarling!

Also Great!

The storm around us started to get stronger... Perfect! Now let's make it _**Even Greater!**_

"Well- see, they sent me in here to get you out!" I lied through my teeth. Hah. Ironic that. Former truth seeker lying to trick a Shadow of himself. "We figured out that the only way to split you two was to let me get soul-snatched so I could steal back the powers, split you two apart, and leave Yuuko to her own body while you get your own away from her!" Now that part I was just making up on the spot. How the hell would I even manage to pull something like that off? "Oh- and when I'm all done with that too, I'm gonna dismiss the powers properly this time! That way- something like this won't _**EVER HAPPEN AGAIN!**_"

_**"WHAT WAS THAT!?"**_ Oh- she's really mad now, isn't she? That last part might have been going too far...

Oh well- time to make like a banana and split!

I reached over and grabbed Yukimura's right arm and shoulder. "C'Mon! Let's get outta here!"

And I pulled him away.

Just like I thought, Yuuko couldn't fight back.

"NO!" She screamed- and with good reason too...

The way her very essence seemed to be stretching and tearing away from Yukimura like some sort of...of...Tar? I don't know exactly, but it was sticky looking!

"WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!" It was Yukimura yelling that one.

"I JUST SAID WHAT I'M TRYING TO DO, WEREN'T YOU LISTENING?!" And I kept pulling and pulling...!

The Shade that was Yuuko lost her features as she stretched and stretched...!

And then...!

_**SNAP!**_

Inga suddenly was falling backwards- holding a boy in his arms as Yuuko suddenly transformed into a ghastly mess of shadows and elemental powers.

"NO! NO NO NONONONONOOOOO!" it was yelling, somehow losing all semblances of humanity with whatever ties to the mortal realm it had being lost.

And I watched as it began swirling and swirling tighter and tighter into a singularity...

And then "Yuuko" exploded into a brilliant flash of light.

What came next, I wasn't sure how to process.

When the smoke cleared, I finally got a look at the boy that Inga had dragged out of Yuuko...and then I realized that it was Yukimura...

And at the same time, standing where Yuuko had been...

Was Yukimura.

Except Yuuko was still a girl...

Also, both were completely naked, which helped with the gender identifying part, but even so...

There were two of them? The boy was currently unconscious, and the girl...was looking around like she had no clue what had just happened...And then she fell to her knees, and then flopped down onto her side, joining her twin into the land of slumber.

"Inga," I breathed, "what did you do?"

Inga turned around to grin at me, "Well, Kazamori, I think I just pulled Yuuko and Yukimura apart."

"Well-" Shinuuurou coughed. "That was...something."

"Why are there two Yukimura's?" Yozora was asking as Sena helped her up.

"I think that's the million dollar question right now..." Kodaka said...

"Inga!" An came running over then, and scooped both him and me up into a hug. "That was simultaneously the bravest and dumbest thing I've ever seen anyone do!" And then with a deep breath she added, "I'm glad you're both alright...!"

"Agreed, Inga," I said, "don't ever do something stupid like that again."

"I'll do it as many times as I want to," Inga protested, "just so long as nobody ever gets hurt!"

"So what happened here?" Rie asked. "Inga pulled Yukimura out of Yuuko and...what?"

"Memories," Inga said as An let go of us, "I said I'd separate Yukimura's memories of the time Yuuko possessed him from everything before that."

"Him...?" Shinjuurou frowned- "But Yukimura was a girl before..."

"Raised as a boy," Rika said. "We all thought she was a he up until very recently."

"Yuuko settled in him a while before that," Inga said, "but until that moment, there wasn't enough of a desire for truth to wake her up."

"Of course," Shinjuurou sighed. "That animal-istic desire you showed when you first woke up..."

"Exactly," Inga nodded, "but since she had a portion of my recent memories, she did it like how we used to go about it. A Question for the Truth..."

"And the murders?" Rie asked.

"I got a glimpse into both of their memories," Inga said. "Yuuko was right about one thing. The moment Yukimura's parents spilled the truth, they got some murderous intent about them, like they were afraid of spilling the truth about something else..."

"Which of course couldn't even happen due to the rules," Shinjuurou said, sighing as he quoted: "One question. Just one question."

"Atsuhiko was a controlled feeding gone too far," Inga frowned, "she got carried away."

"And everything else?" Rie asked.

Inga looked over at the still silent Yusa, jaw wide open and eyes wide as she tried to process just what had happened. "Protection."

"Protection?" An asked in surprise.

"Yuuko wanted to protect what was precious to Yukimura. She was just a Shadow made up from fragments of two separate people, but...that was enough for me to use the last of mine and Bettenou's powers to put her in Yukimura's old body while I made Yukimura himself a new one."

"So...No more powers?" I asked.

Inga took a deep breath, and then exhaled a single butterfly. "That's the last of it," he smiled faintly.

And so we all watched as that tiny little butterfly flew up towards the roof and then...

It popped out of existence.

"So I guess the question now is," Shinjuurou began, "what do we tell Katawase?"

"The Demon is Slain," Inga said, "Hope is Triumphant."

"Poetic," An mused, then shook her head, "I"ll go find them some clothes..." And went off to another room.

"I'll get on that then," Shinjuurou said as he brought out his cellphone, and walked off to give Katawase a call.


	9. Don't you cry No More

**CHAPTER 8: "Don't you cry No More."**

An returned then, carrying an arm full of clothes and quickly set to work putting them onto the two freshly made twins.

"So...Spill!" She grinned at me as she worked, "How'd you pull it off?"

"I tapped into Bettenou's powers, I think," I laughed. "I made up some bullshit lie about us having a plan to split them apart and give them separate bodies, and she believed it! I don't know if the memory thing I said I was doing worked or not, but... I guess that'll have to wait until they wake up!"

"I hate to intrude," Kodaka spoke up then, "but what about us? There's no way we can't go back to our normal lives after this. I mean..." he motioned around the room. "Yusa's been orphaned, there are two Yukimura's... and... one of them is a mass-murderer who Also made herself an orphan... I just...how do we move on from something like that?"

Rie just shrugged, "When in doubt, move houses!"

"...What?" Kodaka asked flatly.

"My house got exploded in the last major case we had like this!" Rie laughed, "So I moved in with Shinjuurou!" She then mused, "Since I'm guessing Yukimura's not been staying at her/his place all this time, that shouldn't be a problem taking in the other one, especially since they're probably going to want to sort things out for themselves... Yusa's in the same boat too, but I'm guessing that she can just stay with one of you until that's sorted out too."

"Rika's guest rooms are going to be filled up at this rate," Rika lamented.

"The biggest problem will be keeping quiet about this," Kazamori spoke up, looking at the two girls, Kobato and Maria, who had been completely silent through the whole ordeal. "In that, I don't think that would be much of a problem at all. Will it?" I asked them.

"Nope!" Maria said with a giggle.

"This One has seen Nothing new tonight," Kobato said in a slightly different accent before chuckling a "Ku Ku Ku...!"

Kodaka looked down at the two girls in surprise for a moment, then sighed in agreement. "Yeah, I don't think we'll have a problem with this..."

"Rika will commit her silence for finding out more!" Rika said.

Shinjuurou came back in and said, "Katawase's on her way over. Though, she says that all the evidence completely points at Yukimura... It's going to be hard to explain there being two of him...her?...now."

"Why not just tell the truth?" Rie asked. "I'm kind of tired of all the lies my dad started..."

"Well," I spoke up, "what would you believe? Demons possessing people and then being made into their own person, or...What? Rogue Hypnotists?" And then everyone just said "Rogue Demons." and I kind of had to agree... "You know, that's got a nice ring to it."

**Three days later, cameras flashed against sunglasses.**

"The end result, whether anyone will believe it or not, is that the Rogue Demon "Yuuko" that went on a murderous rampage the last two weeks has been slain," Katawase said to the awaiting Press before her. "The child that the Demon was possessing is expected to survive physically, although we all hope for the best for their speedy recovery mentally. No-one should have to go through the experience they went through."

"What was the child's name?" Some reporter asked.

"We're not at liberty to discuss that," Katawase said. "If the child can recover, we wish for them to be able to lead a normal life outside of being the subject of scrutiny."

"So...Demons and Magic are real, then?" another Reporter asked.

Katawase took her sunglasses and lowered them down her nose ever so slightly so she could look at the Reporter. "You're kidding me right?"

The Reporter glanced around, "Um...no?"

"What's your name?"

"Eva Kitsumi, Ma'am."

"Eva-chan, I've got two words for you: Toaster. Cats." Katawase said those two words, and then shoved her shades back up her nose. "Magic is real, folks. So are Demons. And Kamis. And the Monsters that live under your bed and in your closets." She then said- "Now, believe me or not, but that's the truth of the matter. We at both the Prossecutor's Office and the Police Department struggled over whether or not to say the truth of this case, but after The Rising Sun's internet hacks revealing the Torrid History of the old management's dual deceptions, it was decided by the New Management that the Truth, no matter how strange or bizarre, should be put out there."

**"Well, it's out there," Katawase said as she took off her sunglasses and pocketed it. "Whether or not people believe it is another subject up to debate."**

"That's about all we can ask," Shinjuurou said. "Did you get what I asked for?"

"Yeah," Katawase rolled her eyes. "They in there?"

"Yeah," Shinjuurou nodded.

And with that, he turned to knock on the clubroom door.

Kodaka opened it. "Oh, hi...Um..."

"Relax! We come bearing gifts," Katawase said. "Is Yukimura here?"

A nod, and he let them in.

"Good afternoon, everyone," Shinjuurou greeted.

"Hello," was the general greeting from the presently half-sized Neighbor's Club.

"It's good to see you again," Yukimura bowed, showing off his different hairstyle.

Shinjuurou raised an eyebrow, and Sena spoke up saying, "He's experimenting around."

"Ah," he said with an understanding nod.

"You said you brought gifts?" Maria asked.

"Mostly a birthday gift, of sorts," Katawase said, pulling out a small envelope from her coat, and handing it to Yukimura. "Since Yuuko took your old body, and you've got a whole different set of fingerprints now anyways to boot, we thought it best if we whipped up a new one for you."

Yukimura opened the envelope and pulled out its contents to look it over.

"Yukimura, Harley?" he raised an eyebrow at the Birth certificate that was the main bulk of the envelope's contents.

"We wanted you to still keep your common name, but we had to switch it up to the last name, rather than the first, since, well, Yuuko, again..." Shinjuurou said, grimacing slightly.

"Thank you," Yukimura bowed. "I feel like I can finally start my life properly now."

"Just be sure to stick close to your friends, alright?" Katawase said. "Can't go wrong with people like them."

"Will do." Yukimura nodded, then paused to ask, "How's my...er...How is she doing?"

The room went tense for a moment, then Shinjuurou sighed.

**"Honestly," He explained, "she's awake last I heard, but...she's pretty much lost all of her memories save basic things like how to move and talk. But the more complex things things...like math and identification... it's like she's just never learned it to begin with."**

"Can you remember the name of this food item?" A doctor asked, holding up an apple.

"Sorry," The girl in the bed shook her head 'no', "I can't."

He turned the apple around, and asked, "And what color is this?"

"I don't know, sir."

It was green.

**"We're hoping that she'll right herself out eventually, make new memories and all that..." Shinjuurou shook his head, "But the doctors don't think she'll be getting out of the hospital any time soon."**

"I see," Yukimura frowned slightly. "And you still think it would be for the best if we don't meet face to face?"

"We just don't know what will happen with her until she forms her own memories," Katawase shook her head. "I haven't even spoken with her. There's just too much of a chance she might relapse into a coma."

"In the end, though," Kodaka said, "I suppose this is about as much of a happy ending as we could get."

"I suppose so," Shinjuurou agreed, then asked. "So how's Yusa-chan doing?"

"Settling in," Kodaka said. "She's staying at Rika's place. Rika and Kobato are with her right now helping her get everything moved into the guest room."

"You're not helping?" Katawase asked.

"Yusa wanted to move the _light_ stuff by herself, she insisted really." He then said flatly, "Yukimura and I have to take care of moving all the heavy stuff when we head over later."

"You're staying with Kodaka and Kobato, right?" Shinjurou asked of Yukimura.

"Yes," He nodded. "It's somewhat more appropriate, I think, given Rika's...ah...hobbies." He seemed embarrassed to a degree. "I'd rather not be subject to any scientific experiments right now."

"Oh, speaking of Rika! I've got a gift for her too," Katawase then pulled out another envelope from her coat and placed it on the table. "It's the application for internship at the Police Department's tech office she requested. So be sure to get that to her, and have her send it in to my office. The address is printed on the side of the envelope there."

"I'll make sure she gets it," Kodaka said as he picked the envelope up and went over to his bag to put it inside with his school books.

"Thanks," Katawase said with a smile.

"So what about us?" Yozora asked. "Got Anything?"

Shinjuurou and Katawase shared a glance, and then Katawase added, "I suppose I should mention that that application is completely blank, beyond the division name that it's for, and could be photo-copied at any Family Mart within the city. Really, could be copied about as many times as you want..." She then added in a slightly-fake-serious tone, "But you shouldn't do that copying thing at all! It's against the law you know!"

"There isn't a copyright on it though, is there?" Shinjuurou asked.

"Oh, right!" Said in a fake surprised tone. "No there isn't..." Katawase laughed with a "Hue Hue Hue!" and then said, "So be extra careful about keeping that away from any photo-copier machines!"

Yozora laughed a single "Ha!" and ordered: "Kodaka! Be sure to get Rika to get us a copy of it for each of us!"

"Don't you mean '_don't_ get us a copy' of it?" Kodaka asked flatly.

Sena just put her hands over her ears and mumbled, "I'm not hearing any of this!"

"Same here!" Katawase grinned, "I hear Nothing! Nothing at all! Consider that an early graduation present."

"Anyways, we've got places to be," Shinjuurou said with a small bow. "I hope we _won't_ be seeing each other again any time soon." The way he stressed the "won't" made it sound like he was expecting the opposite. "Especially on any sudden Internships that nobody was expecting?"

"Of course not," Yukimura raised his hand in a salute. "You have our word on that!"

"And no crossed fingers, guys!" Katawase said with a grin as she and Shinjuurou turned to leave.

**The heavy wooden door closed with a muted 'thunk' through the monitor's built-in speakers.**

Kashiwazaki, Pegasus, frowned slightly as he turned the camera feed away from his Daughter's Clubroom to the hallway that the Detective and Police Chief were walking through.

"Just what is your game, Defeated Detective?" He asked aloud. With a scowl, he opened a small drawer and slid out an old-fashioned rotary phone.

He picked up the receiver and spun the dial.

After a few moments, he said into the receiver, "Cell 69 please."

After a few moments, a light on the phone came on, and he put the receiver down.

The moment he did such, the image on the monitor suddenly cut to a live camera feed of a familiar face.

_"Ah, Pegasus-san,"_ Kaishou, Rinroku, said with a smile. _"A pleasure as always. To what do I owe the sudden and unexpected call?"_

"Yuuki, Shinjuurou has just left the Academy," Kashiwazaki said. "He and the new Police Chief delivered letters of internship to my daughter's club."

_"Unexpected, but I doubt Shinjuurou knows of our little...deal."_ Kaishou frowned. _"My daughter on the other hand... Rie might have begun to see through the ruse..."_

"Given the rings on her and the Detective's fingers, I'd say that's a fair bet," Kashiwazaki growled. "Your information had better be good, Kaishou. Associating with a a real life Convicted Criminal is never worth the risk like it is on TV."

_"It's never worth it on TV either,"_ Kaishou gave a smirk. _"But yes, My information is as solid as it has ever been."_

"You thought the Detective would never catch on to the Academy either," Kashiwazaki hissed at the man who had once been so powerful. "And yet he did. He brought a giant magnifying glass down upon St. Chronica's Academy, and nearly exposed the dark underbelly of our alliance to the light of day! They put EYES on the SCHOOL, Kaishou! There's talk of the Prosecutor's Office forming a Supernatural Investigation Squad! All it takes is one sudden deduction and-!"

_"Relax, Pegasus-san, as long as you keep things calm for the foreseeable future, nothing will bring their attention back to the School."_

"How can you be so calm for a man in cuffs?"

_"Because my daughter comes to visit once a week with ultrasound photos. They're surprisingly calming on the soul."_

"Says the man who's daughter is sleeping with the man we both fear will destroy everything we've worked so hard to build."

_"He's lost the use of Inga's powers, as well as the R.A.I.'s technological advantage. He's crippled. There's nothing that he can do to suss out the full truth of things now."_

There was a knock from behind at the door to alert him to someone's presence. "Sorry, but I'm going to have to cut this short," He then hung up before hearing a reply.

He turned around in his chair to face the other side of the desk, and then pressed a button to hide the monitor and phone, as well as to signal the person outside his office to enter with a buzzer.

The door opened, and a familiar figure stepped in through the door.

"Kate-Sensei," he greeted. "I take it that the powers of both Kami 'Inga' and Kami 'Bettenou' are now forever out of our reach?"

"It seems that way, Kashiwazaki-dono," Kate Takayama, Maria's older sister, nodded with a flat expression on her face. "Their combined powers were completely extinguished in transforming the Demon 'Yuuko' into a human. Subject 'Yukimura' shows no signs of residual energy, either."

"How goes the research into the remaining Lost Kami Statues?" He asked.

"Research indicates that there are shrines in China and Africa that seem to be untapped," she replied. "Shall we slate them for recovery and transport to the school?"

"No," He shook his head, "we drew too much attention to ourselves by drawing the remnants of 'Inga' and 'Bettenou' here, and further merging them with the child 'Yukimura'...the experiment was a complete failure in too many ways..." He frowned. "Send an agent to each location, and have them attempt to draw the Kami within into themselves." She nodded and turned to leave, but then he added, "Oh, and make sure they know this is a completely _Voluntary_ act of self-sacrifice, Kate-Sensei. We don't want anyone thinking we're forcing this on them like the last experiment..."

"Understood, sir..." Kate nodded, and then turned to the door.

With that, Kashiwazaki, Pegasus, pressed the button again, and turned around to face the camera monitor, now displaying empty hallways and an empty club room.

**"Kaishou, you'd better be right about this..."**

"Of course I'm right!" Rie said with a nod. "This is going to be the best post-dinner dessert ever!"

Kazamori and Inga both stared at the giant bowl (Which really used to be half of a glass globe that had survived destruction) of Strawberry jello that had random fruits stuffed into it.

"I didn't even think we could use that as a bowl," Kazamori said.

"Is...is that a banana in there?" Inga asked as he spied a yellow curved fruit sans skin floating in the gelatin.

"Geeze! You guys act like I'm a horrible chef or something! You two haven't even tried it yet!" Rie pouted.

"You filled a three gallon bowl and expect us to eat it for desert!" Inga practically yelled- "I don't think all four of us could eat that much even if we skipped dinner and lunch first!"

"Hm..." Rie considered the giant bowl for a moment, "Maybe I did fix a bit too much..."

Thus was the sight Shinjuurou saw as he walked in through the front door. "...Is that the the Glass Globe that broke when Yuuko attacked?" he asked upon seeing the glittering glass bowl.

"It is," Kazamori said as a matter of fact.

"How much-?" He blinked.

"Three gallons," Inga said.

"Do you think I made too much?" Rie asked.

Shinjuurou just sighed and shook his head. "Yeah. I think that might be just a bit much for us alone... Think there'd be enough room in the fridge for left overs?"

"HAAH?" Inga cried out in surprise.

"Hm, I think so!" Rie nodded.

"Kazamori! There's gotta be no way we can eat all of that ourselves!" Inga protested.

"I have to agree," Kazamori nodded. Then... "We must invite everyone we know over to help finish it."

"Now that's the right idea!" Rie snapped her fingers.

And so, as an atypical family interacted in a somewhat typical manner (with in the confines of being confronted with a 3 Gallon Bowl of Strawberry Jello), a single Toaster Cat just watched them from the counter top, and meowed.

Yes, Kato thought, this was certainly a decent, ordinary life to be had.

**A Cell Door slammed shut.**

Kaishou, Rinroku stepped out of his cell, and was lead down the hallways to the phone room where the prisoners would chat with a visitor.

With a calm look on his face, Kaishou, Rinroku sat down at a chair, and picked up a phone to speak to the person on the other side. "Hello there, I don't believe we've had the pleasure of introducing ourselves," He greeted as the other end was picked up. "But since this is the second surprise I've gotten today, I'm in a curious mood, so I won't ask your name just yet. Would you mind telling me what this is about?"

The man on the other end smirked, and then put a small envelope into their end of the Item-Tray drawer before sliding it over and stating, "Why, it's a Mystery, Kaishou-san."

Kaishou picked up the envelope and opened it, pulling out the contents to read. "Well well, I'll certainly say it is." He looked his visitor straight in the eye and asked. "Since you already know my name. I'd consider it rude if I didn't know yours."

"I'm just...The Messenger," There was a chuckle over the line, "my Employer is the one who wishes you to solve this."

"Sorry, but I'm out of the Detective Business, don't you know?" Kaishou apologized. "Maybe my Daughter or her Husband-To-Be would-"

"My Employer wants _you_, Kaishou-san, and not your daughter." The man cracked a grin, and said, "In case it wasn't clear, we're not asking you to do this." He stood up and concluded, "I'll be in touch, Kaishou-san, to check in on your progress." And with that, he hung up and turned to leave.

Kaishou frowned, and looked over the contents of the letter once again with a sigh. "And I was actually starting to enjoy prison life," he stood up and turned towards the guard that escorted him. "Could I request a stop to the Library? I have something I need to check out."

**TO BE CONTINUED.**

**AFTERWORD.**

**UN-GO**  
**The Lost Souls Job**

_**The Lost Souls Job **_**came about as a sequel to **_**The Working Title Job**_**, namely to tie up the loose plot threads of Inga and Kazamori's relationship, and the explosion of energy that transformed the world. I'm not ashamed to say that it was a hollow plot at best. All I really had in mind for the story was a single conclusion- of Inga protecting Kazamori from a soul-taking, and then turning it back upon the alter-ego that he'd shed in TWTJ. I started work on TLSJ soon after completing TWTJ, but found myself stumped soon after introducing the first victim- Atsuhiko, Hirokazu. **

**I forgot about TLSJ for a short while, focusing instead on other projects (Mainly **_**Vamola! Kyoryuger! **_**a sequel to **_**XWAU02**_**) for a time... And then my mind wandered to one such project that I'd also run into a stumbling block with. It was a HaGaNai story, in which Rika and Kodaka saved Yukimura from a suicide attempt. But soon after that critical opening scene... Just like with TLSJ, I soon hit a stumbling block.**

**As I worked the plot out in my head for that story, I found myself inspired by a fan-piece for HaGaNai that involved Yusa and Kodaka. Admittedly, I was originally going to write something of a Lemony nature at first between them...but as I worked out that plot, I realized that it was vastly out of character for the both of them, so I had to come up with a reason WHY this was happening and... The idea of Yukimura going Yandere and killing Yusa's father popped into my head.**

**Almost immediately, I fused the two stories together, and... The full plot of TLSJ was formed. Plot points were heavily rewritten, of course, as now two separate stand-alone stories were now fused together into a Xros-Over... One major plot line that was to be the B-Plot of the HaGaNai story ended up shoved into it as what appears to be an after thought. Kobato and Maria just...ended up being barely there in TLSJ, much like Inga and Kazamori ended up barely being there in TWTJ. If pattern continues, the sequel to this story may just feature them a bit more.**

**The HaGaNai cast in general ended up taking less of a center stage to the story. There...just isn't much room for them in this rather random Xros-Over. I mean...I took an Echii Harem Comedy and meshed it into the same universe as a Detective's Story. You don't see these things mixing very often and... There's a reason for that. This story is that reason. Writing this was a long and tortured experience and after a long break half-way through, I just pushed myself through to the ending.**

**God, the first draft of this story is just... It was a mess, I'm going to say that right now. Who knows how even the second draft compares to it...Better, yeah, but there's a lot of polish that needs to be (or has already been) done (depending on the point of temporal divergences that this authors note is being read from). **

**As I said at the end of TWTJ, Kazamori and Inga weren't... really a stable couple. Over the course of the time skip between stories, these two tried to work things out. They were making progress, sure, but... there was something that was nagging them both. "What if Inga got his powers back?" There was a subtle tension I had in mind that didn't really carry into the story's first draft, and I feel like the piece suffers for it.**

**With regards to merging two uniquely separate stories into one... I feel like it's a hit or miss thing. Some scenes blended perfectly together, while others...really didn't. The first draft also had a major problem with the first/third person problem, again from rather conflicting narrative styles. HaGaNai is First Person, and Un-Go was mostly Third Person. Marking POV switches in the first draft was a major puzzle as well, and somewhat confusing. I settled on a mostly First Person story this time around, with occasional Third Person perspectives that also sometimes turned out to be First Person perspectives!**

**The Chapter Titles come from lyrics of the song "Carry On Wayward Son," which helped me push through the first half of the story. Naturally, I first heard it from the TV Show _Supernatural._ Hah. Irony right there...I suppose?**

**THE CAST**

**UN-GO DETECTIVE AGENCY:**

**Shinjuurou Yuuki takes a less...leading role in this story. He's less of a lead than the other leads, I think. The intent of his character arc in TLSJ was not-so-much for him to be the Hero that he was in TWTJ. He's there to support the other leads and to be there as a sounding board of sorts, even though he IS running an investigation. He's a sort of Decoy Protagonist, I suppose, to Inga, given the conclusion of the story.**

**Rie Kaishou as well has a reduced roll in the story due to the above and also...She's two months pregnant, as a consequence of what happened in TWTJ. In writing TLSJ, I found that I was written into a corner... Rie ended up being just an expy of herself, flanderized, basically, to the point of her having random cravings for strange food. I tried to keep her in-character as she appeared...but...there's just something off in the writing that I know is off. **

**Inga was horribly out of character in TWTJ. He barely did anything, and... That wasn't right. TLSJ was my way of correcting that. **_**The Lost Souls Job**_** is Inga's story, although it doesn't show completely. He's struggling with becoming human, and having lost most of his Demon-y powers. Inga wanted to be of use to Shinjuurou now that these changes had happened, and so when it turned out that someone with his Powers was out causing trouble... He had to jump in and correct it.**  
**Inga could have used that final moment to regain his full powers, but instead let it all go and used them for another purpose... The first draft of the scene was horrible in showing this, but I'm not sure if later revisions make it better or not. It's up to you to make a descison on it, dear reader. **

**Kazamori Sasa, like Rie, was heavily reduced in playability due to the events of TWTJ. (If it hadn't been such a heavy plot device...) Kazamori, however, gets quite a bit of focus in TLSJ. She's now using an actual computer to do her hacking work and is even more settled into having a human body now. **  
**Kazamori and Inga were set up for a fall with Yuuko's appearance, and the idea that what they'd done together was a 'mistake' was a thought that weighed in the backs of both of their minds. I feel like I'm repeating myself, but that First Draft... Ect. Ect.**

**Mayoi Katawase- in a sense- was the UN-GO side's other lead, possibly the main one of the entire story all things considered. Having established her in TWTJ, TLSJ was meant to show her getting into her element and being the Police Chief she was meant to be. She's definitely aware of all of the magical stuff going on around her, but is hesitant to admit it aloud...**  
**Then comes the ending where she does just that. Katawase has to be the coolest Chief ever to make up for both of her predecessors. She definitely starts to hit a stride here, I think.**

**An Osada makes her dramatic return! I think she's accepted by this point that she'll be a part of any major events that happen from now on. She's alright with that now, having felt a sort of...Triumph after throwing Izumi-san's own words back at her at the arrest in TWTJ. We see that here in TLSJ as she helps Inga out with his girl troubles. Sadly, we don't get to see her efforts pan out, damn it Kato! Did you have to steal those chocolates? **

**NEIGHBOR'S CLUB**

**Kodaka Hasegawa takes on the HaGaNai side's Lead roll. He is the protagonist of that story, after all. The HaGaNai narrative has branched off given some subtle background changes from the original story. Instead of his troubles starting after Rika presents a "Time Machine" to him, they start with that conversation going off the rails, and Rika saying her rant from a later book. He rushes in to save Yukimura, but after the next morning, he and the others start falling under the influence of Inga's powers.**

**Rika Shiguma is a smart girl. She comes up with the idea of turning **_**Homestuck'**_**s Auspitice quadrant on it's heels. In the original draft for the HaGaNai story (Tenativly named **_**Diamond Club)**_**, this would have worked out a lot better than it did here in TLSJ. There was a whole story line I'd had in mind, but, alas...merging the stories just didn't allow for it. She's a bit quicker at noticing Yuuko's manipulations, and starts to wonder what it's all about. She'll probably be working alongside Katawase in the future.**

**Yozora and Sena didn't get to do much. Yozora is trying to play detective, and wants to solve the mystery around her. Sena is just trying to be supportive given all that's happened. In the **_**DC**_** Draft, they were to fall into **_**Homestuck'**_**s Kismesis quadrant, to provide a stable Kismesis compared to Kobato and Maria...**

**Who were meant to Vacillate between Kismesisses and Matesprits. There was a whole emotional plot I had in mind for them...and... I just couldn't show it all in this. Only the basic start and Conclusion of it. You could literally cut out both mentions of this plot line and the story wouldn't be affected by it. The reason I left it in, though, was to show that even though all this supernatual stuff was going on, normal life was progressing. Pieces of it might show up in the future as they get older though.**

**Aoi Yusa... Poor thing. Her story just went all over the place. In the **_**DC**_** draft, she and Kodaka were to end up Matesprits. Their emotional conflict and resolution was to be a good chunk of the story... But, since Inga and Kazamori had that plot for TLSJ, I decided to slow their relationship down for future stories to touch on. Her comment of wishing her father would choke was what gave Yuuko the idea to do the killing in that way. She's really regretting her choice of words now.**

**And finally, the "Villain" of the story... Yuuko, who was possessing Yukimura. Yukimura's plot was changed somewhat with the introduction of Yuuko with Inga's powers. But that original plot was just too damn depressing. Yukimura's presence in the story feels like it's barely there at all, despite being a driving factor of the story. That's a subtle clue to the reader that Yuuko is messing with people's memories. Okay, not so subtle, given that I practically spell it out after the Yusa confession scene.**

**Yuuko was damned hard to write. I tried to make her a coherent character, and yet, at the same time, not. She was just a collection of memories from Inga's dismissed powers that settled into Yukimura somehow, and caused trouble. She has a chance at redemption now; however, what comes of it remains to be seen. Yukimura, however, has gotten what he wanted all along: "To be a Real Boy!" Yes, he is Pinnochio. It is him.**

**VICTIMS IN ORDER:**

**Yukimura's unnamed Parents and Chef, and even in the HaGaNai Light Novels I think they're really stuck up for telling their daughter that she's a boy.**  
**Hirokazu Atsuhiko, may he rest in peace, really didn't deserve to die, all things considered. His first name is a shoutout to _Digimon Tamers_ own Hirokazu.**  
**Watanabi-chan's Memories. She's going to wish she could remember what she forgot... But she never will.**  
**Buriki Matsuda, his first name was randomly dragged off of the HaGaNai TV Tropes page (Buriki was the illustrator), his last name is a shoutout to Takato Matsuda of _Digimon Tamers_ (yet again!). No offense was meant to the illustrator by using his name, I just grabbed it at random.**  
**Cronus Yusa, Aoi's father, was basically Cronus Ampora from _Homestuck_, "Nyeh"s and all.  
**

**THE *REAL* VILLAINS:**

**Kashiwazaki, Pegasus, Sena's father. Apparently instigated an experiment which drew in Inga and Bettenou's powers into Yukimura with out his knowing.**

**Kate Takayama, Maria's older sister. She really doesn't act like a Nun in the main series, and she's definitely not acting like a nun here in TLSJ. Seemingly(?) cares for her younger sister.**

**Kaishou, Rinroku. Damn this man. He gave Kashiwazaki Sr. the info about Inga and Bettenou, which caused this whole mess! But...what's this? it seems someone else is entering, stage left...!**

**The Messenger. Who's this Douchebag? I'll admit, I was imagining Koizumi from **_**Haruhi**_** fame when i wrote his dialogue. But is it him? Or someone else? He works for some mysterious employer.**

**WH4T NOW? :]**

**I finish proofreading this, and upload it, then get back to **_**Vamola! Kyoryuger**_**! Buuut... I can leave you all with a mysterious title to tide you over for the sequel to TLSJ.**

_**The Caged Con Job**_

**I think you can guess what it will be about. ;)**

**Thanks for reading this non-linear piece of cross-over fiction. **

**Sincerely, **  
**  
Calum Traveler**


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